To Love Jason Thorn by Ella Maise

Book Review Mar 13, 2025

My review

3/5 stars

Young Olive is in love with her older brother's best friend. An unfortunate message breaks her heart and she grows up with a particular view on relationships. When a movie studio turns her novel into a film, and cast said brother's best friend as the main star, they are forced together to unpick what they really mean to each other.

This was, generally speaking, quite a sweet love story. I particularly enjoyed the crossed wires that Jason and Olive had to unpick between them over the course of the story - it provided some degree of tension without any real drama.

Olive was a very endearing character, and I found her friendship with Lucy to be the most charming aspect of her character. She embodied scorned love in a gentle and likeable way. Jason was a decent male lead, but I did find his character to be a bit over-protective at times.

I struggled with side plot that was running with Olive's creepy ex-boyfriend and her questionable roommate. It seemed an unnecessary distraction and changed the tone of what was otherwise a cute story. I also found the amount of spice in the book to be a little overdone; it felt needlessly explicit at times and took away from their romance somewhat for me.

Book blurb

Jason Thorn... My brother's childhood friend.Oh, how stupidly in love with that boy I was. He was the first boy that made me blush, my first official crush. Sounds beautiful so far, right? That excitement that bubbles up inside you, those famous butterflies you feel for the very first time--he was the reason for them all. But, you only get to live in that fairytale world until they crush your hopes and dreams and then stomp on your heart for good measure. And boy did he crush my little heart into pieces.After the stomping part he became the boy I did my best to stay away from--and let me tell you, it was pretty hard to do when he slept in the room right across from mine.When tragedy struck his family and they moved away, I was ready to forget he ever existed.Now he is a movie star, the one who makes women of all ages go into a screaming frenzy, the one who makes everyone swoon with that dimpled smile of his. Do you think that's dreamy? I certainly don't think so. How about me coming face to face with him? Nope still not dreamy. Not when I can't even manage to look him in the eye.Me? I'm Olive, a new writer. Actually, I'm THE writer of the book that inspired the movie he is about to star in on the big screen. As of late, I am also referred to as the oh-so-very-lucky girl who is about to become the wife of Jason Thorn.Maybe you're thinking yet again that this is all so dreamy? Nope, nothing dreamy going on here. Not even close.