Reviews tagging 'Toxic friendship'

Love, Theoretically by Ali Hazelwood

17 reviews

annahamburger's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Chronic illness, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, and Toxic friendship

Moderate: Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Misogyny, Sexism, Grief, Death of parent, Acephobia/Arophobia, Outing, Abandonment, Alcohol, and Classism

Minor: Animal cruelty, Bullying, Cancer, Drug use, Panic attacks/disorders, Terminal illness, Xenophobia, Vomit, Medical content, and Pregnancy

noellegrace8's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

This is a great, fun romance read that says a ton about character and careers. I love when romances are also plot-driven, and with the excess (in a good way!) amount of physics concepts, university politics, and familial issues, this absolutely fits the bill. The main characters have electric chemistry, and the side characters are also all fully fleshed out and interesting. I liked the date-for-hire idea for a struggling student who's supposed to be above all of that as an academic. And the brother storyline! Good representation. The fact that they stayed friends was so nice. And I actually teared up two or three times while reading this, even though it's not that dramatic of a plot, because I could just feel the emotion of the characters/ where they were coming from so much. I feel like I could relate to and learn a lot from Elsie.

A few low points for me personally were some of the wording that won't age well & cheesy moments that seemed to lean a bit too much into the classic tropes of the genre instead of modern takes, which is typicsl of Hazelwood, and the epilogue. I'm not really into the trope of adding prologues and epilogues to romance novels, I'm not really sure where that came from and why it's so popular. But this prologue didn't add anything to the plot, and the epilogue was mildly confusing. I felt like maybe it was a callback to something within the book, but if it was, I had completely forgotten about the reference by the time I reached the epilogue. Also, what happened to Kyle?? And, I got annoyed by the idea that Elsie's brothers were fully grown adults acting like children, and the mother is okay with that, AND Elsie entertains it? Moments talking about her brothers fighting over some chick were just not convincing to me at all.

I don't factor audiobook performance into my overall review of a book, but I would give Thérèse Plummer 4/5⭐️. She did a fine performance, although her male voices came across as a bit odd, unlike some other female narrators I've heard.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cursing, Misogyny, Sexism, and Sexual content

Moderate: Ableism, Chronic illness, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, Outing, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Alcohol, and Classism

Minor: Body shaming, Bullying, Confinement, Domestic abuse, Rape, Self harm, Excrement, Medical content, Medical trauma, Acephobia/Arophobia, and Gaslighting

unboundbooklover's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content

Moderate: Toxic relationship, Gaslighting, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Death of parent, Abandonment, and Alcohol

kalefactory's review against another edition

emotional hopeful lighthearted reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content and Toxic friendship

Moderate: Sexism and Abandonment

Minor: Death and Death of parent

mishaps's review against another edition

lighthearted medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cursing, Emotional abuse, and Sexual content

Moderate: Chronic illness, Misogyny, Toxic relationship, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Child abuse, Death of parent, Outing, and Sexual harassment

reiverse's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful informative reflective relaxing sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? N/A
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content

Moderate: Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Toxic relationship, Death of parent, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Sexual harassment, and Classism

whynotreadwithalex's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This is my favorite of the interconnected standalone books in The Love Hypothesis world. 
Elsie's internal struggle to understand (and then articulate) who she is and what she wants was so beautiful (and hit very close to home). And Jack...is absolutely precious. I love that he communicates so well and that he is incredibly patient with her. 
I literally couldn't put this down! Loved every moment of it. So much joy and happiness!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cursing, Sexism, Sexual content, and Toxic friendship

hannalizzy's review against another edition

challenging tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

I love Ali Hazelwood, but this one was just…cringe. In my opinion, the characterization of the main character was much too heavy handed. It felt like Hazelwood had a madlibs-style formula to come up with Elsie’s personality traits, since her main personality traits outside of physics are Twilight and Cheese. Yes, I said cheese. The cheese jokes were so weird, I could not stop getting tripped up over them. How is cheese a personality trait? And I love Twilight, but saying “#Bellice4evah” within the first three pages was a serious crime. The word “Smexy” also made an unfortunate appearance later on.

Also all the student emails peppered in throughout the book were so whack and unbelievable (a student asking their physics professor to check a pimple for them? Come on.) I think she was really going for the “com” in romcom and the overwhelming amount of cringe quips made me lower the star rating bit by bit as I inched my way to the ending. 

Overall, the main character was wayyy too self aware to believably be so misguided about herself and the way she viewed the world. I also wish that Hazelwood wouldn’t lean so far into the misunderstanding trope for almost every conflict, it gets so exhausting and makes me want to dnf when the problem could be solved in a single sentence that everyone’s refusing to say for the weakest reasons. 

All that being said, Jack is hot asf. And if you have a size kink, know that Hazelwood’s got your back. Did appreciate the aro/ace rep and the main character being diabetic (plus him being all caring about her levels was adorable)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cursing, Sexism, Sexual content, and Death of parent

Moderate: Toxic relationship, Medical content, Outing, Toxic friendship, and Sexual harassment

theespressoedition's review against another edition

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Death of parent and Acephobia/Arophobia

laura_wild's review against another edition

fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.75

there are too many typos and the Jack is really creepy sometimes 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexism, Sexual content, and Classism

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Cursing, Emotional abuse, Misogyny, Suicidal thoughts, Medical content, Death of parent, Acephobia/Arophobia, Outing, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, and Sexual harassment