Brief Summary of the Storyline: For the past four years Thomas Henderson has made Liz’s life a living hell. She’s finally free from him, beginning her post-doc, when suddenly he is forced into her life more than ever before. Instead of spending time apart, they are now forced to work together and live together! The arrangement only has to last for the next three months, but can they make it?

Tropes:
-Age Gap
-Boss/Professor
-Kind of Enemies to Lovers
-Forced Proximity
-He Falls First
-Rich Guy
-Texting

The Good:
-Lots of diversity, good writing, and excellent side characters.
-Daichi is such a well written and hilarious character. I want a book on him.
-Lots of funny and cute banter
-Talk about periods, which I thought was nice (super cute scene in Chapter 22-23)
-Her dad is so wonderful. I absolutely adore him.

The Not-So-Good: Thomas. I couldn’t stand him. He did a lot of things wrong and I truly felt that he didn’t grovel nearly enough, especially compared to the severity of his actions.

The Bad: They are both quite manipulative people. Neither of them particularly care if they are hurting people.

Overall: After the first nine chapters, I thought this was a very cute book. If Thomas was being normal, the book was very enjoyable. The dialogue was very well written and I really enjoyed the banter. Both characters, but especially Liz, were very witty. I think that, granted the Hero didn’t do the same types of things as Thomas, I would very much enjoy reading more books by this author. Especially if they had a book about Daichi and his story.

Pace: Medium pacing. Nicely done. Progresses nicely.

Hero Rating: 1.5 I actually hated him for the first nine chapters. He has his moments of doing really sweet things for her. He pays attention to the little details and is willing to wait on her hand and foot. He is also funny, smart, and protective. However, he doesn’t respect her boundaries or privacy AT ALL. If he is given any sort of power over her, he immediately abuses it and uses it to control her. In the background you can see that he could be a very good and loveable character, but personally he is too controlling for me.

Heroine Rating: 3.5 I like that she is witty, sassy, and smart. Liz as a character was very satisfying because I felt like she said a lot of things that woman wish they could. She almost never hesitated to say what was on her mind and always stood up for herself. The only thing that I didn’t like was that she is manipulative and didn’t mind hurting others.

Triggers: Yes
-Age Gap
-Alcohol Use
-Death of a Parent (Cancer)
-Manipulation
-Mentions of Groping (Chapters 17-18)
-Toxic Relationship

Diversity: Yes. The heroine is a woman in STEM. There is also a man from Nigeria and an Asian Professor who has his own lab.

POV: Dual Pov

Spice Level: 2/5

⭐️Rating: 2.75/5
⚠️TW: Parental death, Cursing, Step-Siblings
❣️Tropes: Enemies to Lovers, Age Gap
Would I recommend this book?: Maybe not


Disclaimer: I received this book from Netgalley im exchange for an honest opinion. Thank you Netgalley for the ARC!


Review:

I found this book to be a quick read. Not bad, but nothing stood out to me. It wasn’t gripping and often times I found myself skimming and then having to go back and reread. The 4 year time skip from the very first meeting to the focus of the book was okay. I would have liked there to have been more detail about how terrible Tom had been given that much of the conflict (at least to start) hinged on his behavior. We as an audience kept hearing about how he was terrible and harsh, but I would’ve appreciated getting to see some of it. Even a flashback would’ve been nice. A more minor point but in the same vein as telling more than showing us, Tom’s wealth was repeatedly brought up but was just dictated rather than organically shown.

The relationship between Tom and Liz often felt more like lust than building love, which made the love confessions at the end feel rushed. That being said the sex scenes (there were multiple) weren’t bad at all. An element I liked was that it did feature Liz’s ex in the story as he attempted a comeback, which is a favorite side trope of mine. Overall its a fine story to binge with a rollercoaster of ups and downs to a satisfying happy ending.

Elizabeth 'Liz' Maclean has finally escaped the hell that is Dr Thomas Henderson as her PhD assessor only to be faced with having to work next to him on the same lab bench after his lab sets fire (if only it was Tom himself instead)! Then to find out, to their horror, that Liz's dad and Tom's mum are getting married! And finally, on top of that, Liz has been kicked out out of her apartment with no where to go besides to the last place on Earth she wants to be - Tom's place. So, now these two people who hate each other are stuck working together, living together and partaking in their parents wedding! But, all that being said, do they really hate each other? Or was it all just a ruse of their true feelings?

Overall, I found Tom and Liz to be really toxic to each other. Sure they had sweet moments between them (for example when Tom goes out of his way to buy things while Liz is having a bad month with her period), but as a whole they were really horrible to each other. Tom interferes in Liz's life without her knowledge, Liz leads him on for revenge, all the while making excuses that it's justified. It's not. If this were real life, it would be considered huge red flags and a super unhealthy relationship. Even though by the end, everything has worked out perfectly, to know your partner is capable of actions like that? No thank you.

Overall, it was easy to read. Sex scenes were nice and spicy. Side characters were fun. And I enjoyed the mentions of anime/manga, but I just couldn't get past the two main characters. Even though they eventually decide to pursue a relationship with each other despite becoming step-brother and step-sister, they are just too immature to be liked. In all honestly, they both just needed to grow up and act their age. 2/5 stars

This was a fun read! If you enjoyed love hypothesis you will enjoy this book as well!

Fun nerdy romcom!

Forced proximity
He’s a jerk to her to avoid making a move
Her dad surprises her with shocking news
She sees him as her mean assessor but will that change?
He sabotages her dates and her trying to find flats to move out of his house
He admits to liking her while drunk but she doesn’t believe it in his condition
I love the pining for each other but how it’s a constant repeat of pinning then making progress and then ruining the progress and repeat gets a bit to much
The pinning should be carried out but not repeated every few chapters because that makes the read a whole lot longer and makes it exhausting eventually
Will all the secrets of him sabotaging her be revealed or will he be able to keep them hidden to keep her?
Will their parents end up getting married?
Will their relationship work out ?

This was a amazing read with nice spice. I rather didn’t like that the experiments mostly was the same as the love hypothesis and i also didn’t like how repetitive the middle of the story was.

4 out of 5 stars - If you ask me, I'll tell you to read it

Thank you to NetGalley and BooksGoSocial for this advanced copy. All opinions are my own.

Liz and Tom have known each other for several years. Tom was Liz's PhD assessor, and he was tough to work with. So, just when Liz thinks she is finally done with him and moving on to a new post doc role, he comes boomeranging back into her life. His lab burns down and where does he end up working? Her lab bench. Worse? They learn that their parents met in a grief support group and are now getting married! But wait, that's not the bottom... Liz's landlord gives her less than a week to move out.

I enjoyed the touch of science that was mentioned without getting too detailed. I enjoyed the characters, even if I found them a little over the top at times. It was a quick read, and I'd recommend it.

Tom and Liz cross paths professionally, and in order to maintain some distance, Tom is less than kind to Liz despite his feelings for her. They end up in each other’s lives again and this is Tom’s chance to show her his true personality. The conflict was a bit much for me and wasn’t very redeemable. I’d recommend to those who liked The Love Hypothesis. Liz was a great main character and easy to root for. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this advanced copy!

Honestly it was a BETTER version of The Love Hypothesis, because I found it really boring but with a hero that made me mad so much for no reason I couldn’t give it any other rating.
I find it really odd and stalker-ish for him to what he has done to keep her closer.. His “reasonings” were so bad I hated how he treated her like shit, according to both of them( there was never mentioned a situation like that, with details and I wanted the DRAMA!) for four years, just because she was his “student”. That was really immature of his, since he is older and should be kind of wider.
Liz was sweet, although so clueless and ger mind was going 100 miles per hour with the way her mind changed I wanted to just smack her in the head. She lead on Tom so many times just because she could. I was furious with her.
The situation with Liz’s dad made me mad so much too. It was like a little “argument” but he actually hurt his woman so badly I wanted to ugly cry for her. The grovelling between them wasn’t enough. As much as it wasn’t with Liz and Tom. He explained, apologized and she forgave him. I like when the man grovels BAD, understands his mistakes and begs on his knees.
The whole characters just weren’t it for me. I didn’t connect to the book at all, although it still kept me entertained.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and the author for providing me with a free eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This book was great. Both characters are flawed but the sexual tension you could feel through the book was intense. Can't wait for more from this author.

I am a HUGE The Love Hypothesis fan but this book had many issues and at 41%, I had to stop reading.

1. I felt the writing was far too flat. Instead of telling us that Tom 'had to be mean' to Liz for his own sake, it would've been a lot better for the writer to have either shown it to us or leave us in a bit of suspense. Explicitly saying what he was about to do completely ruined that plot. It made it sound silly. I wish the author could've shown not told us his actions.
2. The consistent anime references were quite off-putting. I understand using it as a way to get the characters to bond, but the author went into far too much detail. As someone who is not interested in anime, it became a little boring as I am not invested in the topic.
3. I take huge problem with Tom's actions. His toxicity is one thing, which made me not want to root for him, but in one chapter of the book he ignores Liz's consent when she tells him to get out of the room and stop. This is the point at which I stopped reading. I could've excused some of his actions up till this point but I just fully stopped liking him as a character at this point.

I think it is a shame that I am rating this book so low because I was very much enjoying Tom's yearning for Liz and how much he liked her as a person.

This is force fed trope-on-trope-on-trope. Take The Hating Game (not enemies to lovers if one is already in love), splash a hefty dose of cringey anime references, the shoe-horn in about a dozen tropes in the first 5 chapters and this is the story you get. A 38 year old man-child who employs high school aged methods to keep his interest snared and a 27 year old woman who is the archetypal "independent working woman" reminiscent of romcoms of the aughts. Every chapter hands you a new absurdity with little reprieve. The spice is hardly worth the ridiculous menagerie of contrived plot points that read like someone is drawing their favorite tropes out of a hat and throwing them into the story at random. I can't even say this is a "feel-good" easy read since it gave me a wrecker of a headache from the eye rolling and "oh come ON"s. Clearly I'm in the minority here, but I cannot recommend this to even the staunchest rivalry romance readers. There are much better options out there.

**Thank you NetGalley and BooksGoSocial for the eARC**

Thank you @netgalley for my copy of this eARC in exchange of my unbiased opinion.

Liz is a postdoc student who has finally escaped her PhD assessor’s undeserved and over the top criticisms - or so she thinks. Tom has finally made it through the toughest few years of his professional career and is thankfully no longer his dream girl’s assessor. Unfortunately, he’s also blown any chance he may have had with her by being overly critical to try and keep their relationship professional. That is, until life continually tosses them back at each other. First with the announcement of their parents engagement - who even knew they were dating? Then, with a fire in Tom’s lab that has him moving into Liz’s work space for months on end. Followed up by Liz suddenly needing a place to live and having to move in with Tom and their parents. Will their close proximity have Liz seeing Tom in a whole new light? Or will it confirm what she’s thought of him all along?

This was such a witty and steamy read! I love a good enemies-to-lovers, and this one was so well written and had the perfect amount of steam!

This one gets 4⭐️‘s from me!

this book had all the feels. enemies to lover and all that you can imagine. REally liked it and will read more.

I did not expect I'd enjoy this book as much as I did.
I was smiling and giggling throughout most of the book and finished it in one sitting.
This was such a sweet enemies to lovers rom com that follows two nerds, Tom and Liz

Liz was such an enjoyable and funny female main character. Tom on the other hand... Yes, he's hot and funny, but he definitely deserves a smack on the head. He's been pining after Liz for years.
Their banter and tension was just perfect.

There were a few things that bothered me, such as the conflict. It felt quite unnecessary, like in most books with a third act break up.

I really enjoyed this book! The way that they moved from work rivals to a closer relationship as a result of their parents was such a different type of story and it worked AMAZING!

Review Posted on Instagram and Good Reads.

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐔𝐧𝐛𝐚𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞𝐝 𝐄𝐪𝐮𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 was a super fun cute read and I loved it! If you liked The Love Hypothesis and Love on the Brain then you’ll LOVE THIS!
🔬
Elizabeth Maclean thinks she’s finally free from her PhD assessor, Dr Thomas Henderson. In the last 4 years, all he has ever been is an asshole to her. Now that she has found her first big job postdoc, it’s the first time she feels like she can stretch her legs and do what she does best in the lab. However, when Thomas’s lab gets damaged in a fire and shuts down for repairs, he ends up working with side by side with Elizabeth for 3 months.
🔬
What else could be thrown at Elizabeth?

Well her widowed father could be getting married to another widower, who just happens to be Thomas’s mother…🫣🫣

Then… her landlord tells her she needs to move out leaving her homeless. So she moves in with her father, who moved with his future bride, who moved in with … you guessed it Thomas… 🤪

Before this all happened though, 4 years before to be precise, Elizabeth and Thomas were just Liz and Tom who met at a university mixer where sparks flew…

And so the whirlwind of angst, sexual tension, fun, manipulation and redemption begins! Knowing that they both had the hots for each other back when they first met and now they have to work together, You are almost cheering for Liz and Tom to finally to GET.IT.ON. 👀

"𝐇𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐝 𝐬𝐡𝐮𝐭𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐟𝐮𝐜𝐤 𝐮𝐩?"
"𝐍𝐨𝐭 𝐲𝐞𝐭."
"𝐓𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐚𝐝𝐝 𝐢𝐭 𝐭𝐨 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐝𝐨 𝐭𝐨𝐝𝐚𝐲."

The Scottish backdrop is beautiful 😍 As one of the countries on my list to visit at least once in my life, I found I was using Google Maps to see all the places that were mentioned. Love seeing stuff on satellite view 🤣

Such a great read. Thank you to @netgalley and @macfarlane_lantern_publishing for the 𝐀𝐝𝐯𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞𝐝 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐂𝐨𝐩𝐲 in exchange for an honest review.

If you love:

🔬 Lust Meet Cute to Enemies to Friends to Lovers
🧫 Anime loving lead characters
🔬 STEM (both h and H)
🧫 Scotland backdrop 😍
🔬 Age Gap (11 years)
🧫 Forced Proximity

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5 stars

Release Date Sept 15th!

3.4/5

Elizabeth is a newly graduated PhD student and glad to be rid of the PhD accessor from Hell: Thomas Henderson. After an insta love worthy initial meeting years ago, a full personality 180 from him brought breakdowns and ranting sessions for the next 4 years of mandatory meetings and reviews. She graduates and gets a job at a nearby lab, which just happens to be the lab Tom relocated to after his own caught fire. She now has to spend the foreseeable future sharing a lab bench with the only man who truly understands her and the only one she truly hates.

Starting from the very beginning, I loved the content warnings before the book started! I don’t see it too often in published books and thought it was a thoughtful little addition.

The story itself is good. It has moments that I was rooting for them and the trio's friendship is superior and so supportive of each other which I love. It touches on not wanting to get married/have a bushel of children in a healthy, not shaming way that I did really like. It’s something a lot of books get wrong and this one did it well. There were moments where Liz stood up for herself and I loved every second of it.

I loved every second of her standing up for herself because there weren’t a lot of them. He treated her terribly for years because he was attracted to her and wanted to spare his career and at times she could be a pushover with her forgiveness. For a book based on the fact he used to be an asshole, there’s very little groveling. It feels like he just says, “deal with it and move on” when he’s ready to.

Tom had his good moments. He could be understanding and patient and really want to make it up to her. And then 1 page later he’s ready to insert himself into her life and say “so sad, too bad” she’s stuck with him.

This hasn’t even touched on the fact they’re about to be step siblings for most of the book. Their parents announce they’re getting married near the beginning of the book and they constantly remind each other of the fact that one day they may be step siblings. While there’s technically nothing wrong with this (I think), and they did have feelings before knowing it, it still personally gives me the ick.

All that said, the story was good. I love the academic vibes and though there was a slight love triangle I didn’t love, it wasn’t a major part of the book. It could’ve been better if he had selfless motivations and didn’t want to sabotage her career, but at the end of the day he was okay with tearing down all of her hard work to keep his on the pedestal.

4 🌟's!

📝 tropes: enemies to lovers, workplace rom, forced proximity, forbidden/taboo rom, stem rom, banter, age gap
🌶 spice: 2.9/5
❌ CW: sexual harassment

hello was not expecting this to be this good??? i randomly decided to pick this ARC up on Netgalley after reading the premise and it sounding intriguing... little did i know how trope-tastic and fun this one was going to be!

this one has a kind of bonkers plot??? that i was very much here for. tom and liz meet in an earlier timeline where they actually hit it off and were almost getting to second base but things happened and the next thing ya know, our hero, Doctor Thomas Henderson, a PhD assessor, is being assigned to assess our heroine, Elizabeth Maclean, forcing him to switch gears and make their what-coulda-been romance into a strictly professional one. aka, he's a man and starts treating her like shit/coldly for the rest of her doctorate years.
they meet once more when Liz is pursuing her post-doc and Tom has to work in the same lab as her but no more are they buddy buddy.. we get our enemies to lovers entry and a sizzling attraction GAH🤩 the forced proximity doesn't stop there my friends! my jaw dropped when the plot became that both our MC's parents are actually GETTING MARRIED???!?!?! i was very (still am) kinda weirded out that that they are technically step-siblings🥴 but for romance purposes, im just gonna act like that's not a thing lol. so yeah, the setup for this book was so chaotic but fun and slightly messy and i absolutely ate it up.

i could not put this one down you guys!! the banter, the tension, the hate to love.. everything just works🤌🏽 we have a lot of cute moments where they go to halloween parties together, watch anime and cuddle, get snowed in, etc. and it was all just so !!! coupley-romantic in that contemporary way and i freaking adored it🥺

i definitely think it could've shortened down a lot more bc i found myself skimming the last 10% for sure and some background stuff throughout.. nevertheless, i was pleasantly surprised by how much i enjoyed this contemporary, stem romance ... this gave what ali hazelwood's love on the brain should've given 🥲 highly recommend it tho friends!

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own. Thank you to the author for e-ARC via Netgalley. Releases 9/15/22!

If you read The Love Hypothesis and thought, “I wish this were enemies to lovers and also had more spice,” then The Unbalanced Equation is for you.

Set in Scotland, the book follows Elizabeth, who just landed a postdoc position and has to share a lab with Professor Tom Henderson – the Ph.D. assessor who made her life hell, but whom she has a lingering crush on anyway.

Then, the two of them find out that:
• their parents are engaged to each other
• they’ll be moving in together
• neither of them can ignore the attraction they feel

So they decide to torture each other. The banter is 💯, the spice is very hot, and the facts that they both love anime and neither wants marriage or kids make them feel refreshing rather than carbon copies from other books.

I will say that I didn’t adore Tom – it’s pretty much the first time I’ve found a character who would absolutely be considered a rake a little lacking – and I wanted to see a bit more groveling from him for everything he put Elizabeth through. But, I am an Aries, so of course I did.😆 Nevertheless, I appreciated his flaws and character development!

Ultimately, The Unbalanced Equation is a quick read that’s a whole lot of tropey, spicy romcom-y fun – and it might even have you looking into anime.

🌟: 3.75
🌶: 2.5

If you were a fan of The Love Hypothesis, then you would most likely like this one too. Very similar vibe. Enemies to lovers based in a science setting. It does seem to be a bit of a slow burn. This book took me a little bit to get interested, but definitely worth it!

I received this ARC book through net galley for an honest review. Release date is 9/15/22.