Book Review: Meet Cute: Some People Are Destined To Meet by Various Authors

s y n o p s i s

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.

f i r s t  s e n t e n c e

You’re getting another beer in the kitchen and watching two badly dressed sophomores try not to be too obvious about the fact that they’re staring at you, when the cops show up outside Madison Campbell’s house.

m y  o p i n i o n

To be honest, I bought this book just because of the Jennifer L. Armentrout story which is featured in this book. I love her writings so much and didn’t want to miss this little story of her. And of course because of the cover and because somehow everyone on bookstagram had it.

Back when I bought Meet Cute I already heard a lot of not so good reviews about it. Mostly because the book consists of 14 short stories and short stories aren’t everyone’s cup of tea. I thought at first that I wouldn’t like it neither because I haven’t read a lot of short stories in my life (except for school) and I thought I would feel the need of getting to know more about the characters and the story itself. That one chapter isn’t satisfying.

What caught my eye was that it were 14 stories about first love and the ones who are reading this and know me, can agree when I say that I am a sucker for love stories. So, this point and the Jennifer L. Armentrout story were definitely the two things which made me pick up Meet Cute.

And I really enjoyed it.

As some of you might know, I was and still am in a bit of a reading slump and Meet Cute was perfect for this matter. I could quickly read one chapter a time and didn’t have to worry about forgetting important details of the story when I didn’t pick up the book for a few days since first chapters never really include the most important details.

Most of the short stories just consist of 20 pages which is a perfect number and can be read during lunch break or while waiting in the car for your host kid to come out of school, like I did.

The 14 chapters tell about 14 totally different love stories, 14 totally different characters and 14 totally different authors with different writing styles which I enjoyed more than I expected. I am pretty straight forward with what I usually like to read and the variety definitely opened my eyes for other authors and other kind of stories. and I can’t wait to pick up some books from the authors I got to know through Meet Cute.

s u m m a r y

I recommend Meet Cute for everyone who likes to try out something new, who likes to read different views on first love and who hasn’t enough time to finish a novel. I can’t say a lot about the stories because that would just take way too long but my two favorites were The Dictionary Of You And Me by Jennifer L. Armentrout and Say Everything by Huntley Fitzpatrick.

m y  r a t i n g :  4 / 5  ★

Find all details about Meet Cute on Goodreads and Amazon ; Cover Picture.

xo Franziska