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Book Reviews

Meet Cute: Some People Are Destined to Meet

4/30/2018

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SYNOPSIS
Whether or not you believe in fate, or luck, or love at first sight, every romance has to start somewhere. MEET CUTE is an anthology of original short stories featuring tales of "how they first met" from some of today’s most popular YA authors. 

Readers will experience Nina LaCour's beautifully written piece about two Bay Area girls meeting via a cranky customer service Tweet, Sara Shepard's glossy tale about a magazine intern and a young rock star, Nicola Yoon's imaginative take on break-ups and make-ups,
Katie Cotugno's story of two teens hiding out from the police at a house party, and Huntley Fitzpatrick's charming love story that begins over iced teas at a diner. There’s futuristic flirting from Kass Morgan and Katharine McGee, a riveting transgender heroine from Meredith Russo, a subway missed connection moment from Jocelyn Davies, and a girl determined to get out of her small town from Ibi Zoboi. Jennifer Armentrout writes a sweet story about finding love from a missing library book, Emery Lord has a heartwarming and funny tale of two girls stuck in an airport, Dhonielle Clayton takes a thoughtful, speculate approach to pre-destined love, and Julie Murphy dreams up a fun twist on reality dating show contestants. 

This incredibly talented group of authors brings us a collection of stories that are at turns romantic and witty, epic and everyday, heartbreaking and real.
Synopsis from Goodreads

PERSONAL REVIEW
I don’t normally read short stories, but it I kept seeing this book being posted and talked about so I thought I’d give it a try. And I'm really glad I did! While I don't think I'll ever be a huge fan of short stories themselves, I really enjoyed going through these stories and being introduced to new authors. So while there were some things I still didn't like (see below), overall, I'm happy with this read.

Endings With Minimal Information
This is definitely one of the reasons that I just don't usually enjoy short stories, but I found myself frustrated that after being dropped into these characters lives, I was forced back out without any real ending. I’m not expecting happily ever after for everyone, but some endings felt really abrupt and I constantly felt like I was searching for missing pages. And while I do understand that these stories are meant to introduce us to the cute ways that some people meet, but I found that some stories literally ended after the characters simply make eye contact, and that was incredibly frustrating. In one story, we spend the entire time reading about the protagonist being upset with her friend, and then there is maybe half a page where she meets her love interest...and then the story ended. They barely spoke! I really would have liked more from those tales.

Loved That This Was an Anthology of YA Authors
I thought it was wonderful to get to read stories from so many different authors and it's definitely my favourite thing about this book. Some of these authors I knew previously, but many were new names to me, and that was awesome because now I have a new list of authors to investigate! Each author has a different style and voice, and this collection gives readers a chance to get a taste of each of them before finding more books from the authors they enjoyed. It also forced me to think differently about some authors that I previously read but hadn't enjoy their work; I'm definitely more interested in reading more from all of these YA voices and can't wait to find out what books they've had published.

My favourite short stories from Meet Cute:
  • The Way We Love Here by Dhonielle Clayton: This was a beautiful story about love and soul mates. The idea that everyone is born with a soul mate that is waiting to find them is both beautiful and a bit scary. I thought Clayton did an amazing job turning the concept of "soul mates" on its head and giving these characters a choice in the matter. I can't wait to read more from her!

  • Click by Katherine McGee: I’ve read McGee previously but didn’t love The Thousandth Floor, so it was great to read a different work from her!

  • Print Shop by Nina Lacour: I thought this story was really well structured and liked the way we moved through it. I hadn’t heard of Lacour before this, so I’m excited to find more from her.

  • The Dictionary of You and Me by Jennifer L. Armentrout: There was something so wonderful about a couple meeting because of a very overdue library book. This was such a fun way to meet and anything with libraries makes me happy :)
​
All of these stories were fun and give us some really wonderful first meetings -- now if I only I could know about what happens next for these characters! Either way, I'm definitely going to be looking into some new authors!

FINAL RATING: 4/5
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    About Me

    Hi, I'm Alexandra! I love reading (largely YA fiction, but sometimes I'll read "adult" books), playing board games, Nutella, and binge-watching TV shows on Netflix with my husband. 

    I absolutely love to travel, but home will always be in Toronto. Books come with me everywhere and I can't wait to hear if you agree or disagree with my reviews. 


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