I ended up liking this better by the end (at the halfway point, I was thinking it was barely scraping a 3).

The good:
It definitely delivers on the fake-dating for Reasons, grumpy-sunshine, slow-burn, academic women in STEM promises. And there's a pretty great blurry meet-cute, some good snark, dorky science jokes and references, and really good models of communication and consent during the steamy sexy time (an honest to goodness "may I?" makes an appearance).

What didn't work for me:
It was pretty predictable but my biggest issue was that our main characters didn't seem fleshed out and developed early enough for my tastes. I could barely picture Olive, and we're told how exceptional she is but we don't get much of a sense of it because she doesn't see/believe it herself and the hot-mess-of-it-all overshadows her capable, sciencey side. (Don't get me wrong: smart, capable but hot-messy is generally a winningly realistic character to me, though I'm wary of how often it's applied to women and not men). Some of her less than stellar decisions would've been easier to swallow if I could've connected with her better earlier. Also, even though I could picture him better, for much of the book, Adam was so taciturn and weirdly unaware of how others saw him (to the point that I thought he might be neurodiverse, but that was never mentioned) that it was hard to get a handle on his real personality. To be fair, I think there are decent plot-driven reasons for his non-emoting around Olive (and plenty of convoluted plot-driven misunderstandings). There's also some odd, cringey peer pressure from Olive's best friend (which is addressed by the end) that I didn't enjoy.

But most of it *is* addressed by the end, so I'm glad I stuck around for it.

Topics/themes: higher ed, academia, research, funding, women in STEM, BIPOC in STEM, sexual harassment, MeToo, grief, self-doubt, financial struggles, good science, ethics, mentoring
Tropes: fake dating, grumpy-sunshine, professor-student, forced proximity, hot mess, starving grad student, hot scientist
Content notes: death of a parent (backstory), foster system (backstory), abusive academic advisor (backstory), cancer, sexual harassment, lab animal research, peer pressured PDA, strong language, steamy sex

My thanks to NetGalley and Berkley for a digital ARC!