The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood Book Summary

Here’s a summary of The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood to help you remember the main points. Check out this delightful rom-com about a PhD student, Olive, and a grumpy, lab tyrant professor, Adam. This is the perfect book if you’re into fake-dating tropes or romances in academic settings. 

This summary is just to help you remember the main plot points of the book before reading my book review. If you haven’t read the whole book yet, I highly recommend it, so you don’t miss the finer points of the romance and the hilarious banter throughout the entire book. 

Chapter 1

When Olive Smith’s best friend Anh won’t go out with Jeremy because Olive had gone on a few dates with him, Olive lies and says she’s already dating someone else. That night when she’s supposedly on a date, Olive sees Anh and kisses the first man she can see. After the enjoyable kiss, Olive realizes that it’s Dr. Adam Carlsen, the grumpiest, meanest, least-liked faculty in the biology department where she’s a third-year Ph.D. candidate at Stanford University.

After the kiss, Olive asks if they can just forget the whole thing, but Adam makes Olive explain. Then, before he can say anything, Olive panics and runs away.

Chapter 2

On Monday in the biology department, Anh asks Olive about the kiss thinking it must be a mistake, but Olive insists it was a real date. Having come in and heard the conversation, Adam puts his hand on Olive’s back to help convince Anh. Adam offers to walk Olive to her car, but she declines even though she feels relaxed and a little safer in his presence.

The next day, when everyone in the biology grad school seems to know, Olive confronts Adam about the gossip, but he doesn’t seem fazed. Olive struggles because she thinks Adam wouldn’t want anyone to think he’d date someone as unaccomplished as her, but he suggests they let people think they’re dating for Anh’s sake. He also admits that Stanford froze his research money because they think he’s a flight risk but having a committed relationship here would help convince them he isn’t leaving. 

Chapter 3

Olive meets with Adam to accept the fake dating offer and go over her ground rules for a fake-dating relationship including no dating other people, no sex, and no fake relationship off-campus. They also agree to weekly meetings at the coffee shop on campus so others will see them. Olive notes they don’t have much in common, but she can’t help but notice how attractive he is while also being surprisingly nice to her.

Olive admits to her roommate and best friend, Malcolm, that Adam is only her fake boyfriend. Malcolm thinks it’s a horrible idea because he hates the young hotshot professor like the rest of the graduate students. 

Chapter 4

During their first coffee date, Olive does most of the talking but gets Adam to open up a little bit about where he was born. On the second coffee date, Adam is in a noticeably bad mood, but Olive gets him to smile with her teasing. She even notices he got a haircut which makes him look even better. 

As they’re leaving the coffee shop, they run into Adam’s friend, Dr. Tom Benton, who’s in town from Harvard and staying with Adam. Unbeknownst to Adam, Olive has a meeting later with Tom to discuss working in his lab at Harvard on her early screening pancreatic cancer research. 

Chapter 5

Tom invites them both to have coffee with him to hear about Olive’s research and gets her to admit that her mom died of pancreatic cancer. After her pitch, he says it sounds promising, but to send him a report of her current work in two weeks. He also says he’ll see Olive at Adam’s place since he’s staying and invites her to his talk on campus later. 

Chapter 6

In the packed auditorium for the talk, Anh and Olive can’t find seats or space, so Anh convinces Olive to sit on Adam’s lap. After a few minutes, Olive finds she’s very comfortable there, and Adam puts his arm around her waist. After the talk, Anh insists Olive should kiss Adam, and Olive feels butterflies during the quick kiss this time.

Chapter 7

While working in her lab, another grad student from the lab, Greg, comes in upset and takes it out on Olive that Adam failed his dissertation proposal. Olive texts Adam lashes out at him for his attitude towards students but feels bad after. When she sees him at the department picnic, he doesn’t seem mad though.

While he’s playing frisbee shirtless, Anh gives Olive way too much sunscreen and then calls Adam over. Olive is forced to put the extra sunscreen on him, and Olive can’t stop thinking about how muscular he is.

Chapter 8

Late one night Olive runs into Adam in the break room and ends up opening up to him about her mom dying and having no other family. She feels comfortable talking to him and even puts her head on his shoulder. When Jeremy walks in  and asks Olive to walk back to the lab with him, she wants to stay with Adam but reluctantly goes back to work. 

Chapter 9

Tom tells Olive that he wants her to come to Harvard next year to research in his lab. Olive is so happy she hugs Adam and suggests they go for coffee to celebrate. On the way, Olive tries to convince Adam to stop and get their free flu shots on campus.

After some arguing, Olive realizes Adam is scared of needles. She gets him to come along when she promises to hold his hand

Chapter 10

When Anh is teasing Olive about texting Adam, Olive realizes she has a real crush on him. She meets up with Malcolm to discuss it, and Malcolm tries to convince her to tell Adam. Olive refuses because she thinks he’ll leave too, but Adam walks up to overhear her say she has a crush. 

Chapter 11

Olive quickly tells Adam she was talking about another guy. He seems somewhat disappointed and thinks Olive means Jeremy. Olive still thinks Adam could never be interested in her, so she doesn’t say anything.

They’re interrupted by another professor, Holden, who’s one of Adam’s oldest friends. Holden tells Olive some stories of Adam in high school before leaving. Adam tells her that Jeremy would be lucky to have her, but she leaves from fear of crying before they can talk more. 

Chapter 12

When Olive runs into Holden on campus again, he says he’s glad Adam finally asked out the ‘amazing girl’ from the department he’s been talking about the last two years. Holden also tells Olive to watch her back and Adam’s around Tom but doesn’t explain. 

Then, Olive finds out her research was approved for a talk at the next big science conference. But Olive is panicking over her fear of public speaking. When she brings up the conference to her friends, Olive’s friends tell her they all made other arrangements at the hotel because they thought she was staying with Adam. 

Chapter 13

The next time they see each other, Adam notices that Olive seems stressed, and Olive tells him about the conference. Adam says she can stay with him, and, after some convincing from Adam, Olive agrees. She also asks him to come to her talk, and he offers to look over her presentation.

Chapter 14

At the conference, Olive realizes that Adam is the keynote speaker, and his talk overlaps with her talk in another room. After her talk, which goes better than she thought, Tom comes to talk to her and tries to kiss her telling her it’s a preview for next year. He tells her that he accepted her only to take something away from Adam and so she’d sleep with him since her ‘little experiment’ wasn’t good. 

Adam finds Olive crying in the hotel room, but she doesn’t tell him the whole truth because she thinks he’ll never believe her about Tom. Instead, Olive tells him she overheard a stranger saying she only got a talk because she’s Adam’s girlfriend. Adam comforts her by holding her and assuring her she’s an amazing scientist. 

Chapter 15

Adam takes Olive out for sushi to help her feel better, and Olive finds that just being around him helps. Then, he carries her back from the elevator because her shoes are hurting her feet. Back in the room, Olive forgot her pajamas, and Adam gives her one of his T-shirts to sleep in. 

When Olive starts to feel bad again, Adam shares how his graduate advisor was abusive and told him he’d never amount to anything. After their heart to heart, Olive kisses Adam.

Chapter 16

As things get more heated, Olive admits that she’s never been physically attracted like this to someone else. Olive also tells Adam he doesn’t have to do this, but he assures he that he wants to. They end up having sex even though it’s against Olive’s rules.

Chapter 17

In bed together, they talk about their childhoods. Then, Adam admits that he’s interviewing for a position at Harvard for next year to collaborate with Tom. Adam wants to move into the type of research Tom is doing. 

Chapter 18

The next morning, Olive hears through others that the department unfroze Adam’s research funds, and she realizes today is the day they originally decided to end their relationship. Olive goes to see him to tell him they should end the relationship, so he can move on with his career without her telling him the truth about Tom. At first, Adam pulls her in to stay, but then lets her go thinking this is what she really wants.

Chapter 19

The next day when Anh and Malcom come to visit her room, Olive is uploading the recording of her talk onto her computer. She now realizes she forgot to stop the recording, and her friends hear what Tom said to her. They console her and try to convince her to tell Adam as well as report Tom. 

Olive is still convinced that it’s better for Adam not to know about Tom or her real feelings. But she goes to talk to Holden who tells her that Adam is only considering the Harvard job because Olive’s supposed to be there.

Chapter 20

Olive finds Adam at a Harvard interview dinner, and he immediately comes to ask her what’s wrong. When Tom also comes up and won’t leave, Olive starts playing the recording of what he said. Adam loses it, pinning Tom to the wall, and threatening Tom for doing this to the woman he loves. 

Olive has to talk Adam into releasing Tom. Then, Adam asks for the recording and to meet with the Harvard Dean immediately. 

Chapter 21

In all the chaos, Olive doesn’t see Adam until they’re both back in San Francisco the next day. Olive and Adam agree to go on a double date with Malcolm and Holden who started dating at the conference. The dinner helps Olive feel better, and Holden lets slip that Adam has been interested in Olive the entire time and even for years prior. 

Chapter 22

When they’re alone after the date, Adam assures Olive that Tom will be fired and booted from academia. Then, Adam admits that he agreed to fake date Olive because he was already interested in her. Olive tells Adam that she never had feelings for anyone else and that she loves him. 

Epilogue

Ten months later, Olive is getting ready to start her next school year at a lab in Berkeley. Olive’s career is back on track, and she’s been spending all her free time with Adam. She makes Adam recreate their very first kiss in the biology department exactly a year later.

Read the Full Review

Now that you have a refresher on what happens in the book, read my full book review. If you like modern romance novels, make sure to read the whole thing. You can also find recommendations for similar contemporary romances if you liked this one.