This is such a cute collection of short stories! Each one easily and effectively captured both my attention and the spirit of the chosen trope. I am not normally an anthology reader, but this one really caught my attention. I was drawn in by some of the authors I’d read before, but I was also excited to read the stories by authors I hadn’t hear of. Each story had its own unique aspects, but they all worked really well together for the overall anthology. Would highly recommend to all romance and anthology readers!

An anthology of tons of great YA authors and thoughtfully written stories of crushes and first love.

This is an anthology that focuses on romance novel tropes from a young adult perspective. It features ten popular young adult authors and is a diverse bunch. The stories are cute, spunky, and fun to read. My absolute favourite was Liberty by Anna-Marie McLemore. What I especially liked about this anthology is that these narratives take an old trope and throw a new spin on it, so you never know exactly how the ending might turn out (although, expect a bunch of HEAs). I did find a couple of the stories to be a bit too predictable and so they fell a little flat, but overall I enjoyed the banter, the switch ups, the chemistry, and just the fun and love that was so clearly put into this anthology by the authors.

Bye Bye, Piper Berry (Julie Murphy): Featuring a fake relationship between two friends. The girl is trying to make her ex-boyfriend jealous, but the boy she is fake dating is also her ex's best friend. Shenanigans ensue, including scenes with a squirrel costume, and soon real feelings are shining through. This one also featured the next door neighbour trope and was so stinking cute. A great beginning to the anthology.

Anyone Else But You (Leah Johnson): Two high school students become locked in a store together while trying to buy items for their Senior Send-off. The one girl cannot stand the other girl, who is always late and seems like she takes nothing seriously. But, could there maybe be more to the story? This story was well framed, with each section corresponding to the amount of time locked in the store and what comes after. The two both have to confront assumptions they have had about the other. I really loved their chemistry and honesty with one another.

The Idiom Algorithm (Abigail Hing Wen): This was about a middle class boy dating a very rich girl who really seemed to genuinely care very little about him, and the girl rooming with his family that cared a lot. It was cute at times, but I felt this one was a bit too long and too much of the narrative was spent on the boy pining for this rich young woman and not enough time on the relationship forming between him and the young woman who was living with his family. I really wanted more of those two together, as those were my favourite moments in the story.

Auld Acquaintance (Caleb Roehrig): Best friends to lovers trope is a favourite of mine (just behind enemies to lovers). This story was extra sweet, if a little predictable. I liked the idea of a senior class spending the night together in their gym, seemed to build camaraderie. Both boys are on the hunt for the perfect New Year's kiss, but of course you roll your eyes because come on boys you are perfect for one another. I loved how the MC kept getting in his own way, but also how open and honest they finally were with one another.

Shooting Stars (Marissa Meyer): This one bed story was super charming. It involved a class trip on a train, and a scene with ants and a tent that had me laughing. The whole story was funny and the two characters just felt like cute dorks in love, but oblivious to the others feelings. The chemistry between them just leapt of the page.

Keagan's Heaven on Earth (Sarah Winnifred Searle): Right off the bat I loved that there was a format switch up in the middle of this anthology. It kept the pace progressing and added depth. This graphic novel was sweet and the drawings delightful. It felt like peeking in on the perfect way to tell someone you care for them. Specifically, this was about a non-binary individual who found out that someone had a crush on them, and went about trying to figure out who and why. But, it is also about them gaining confidence and making true friends.

Zora in the Spotlight (Elise Bryant): This completely flipped the grand gesture trope, in that the male MC accidentally mistook the female MC for the person he meant to show the grand gesture to. In the end, it screwed up her evening, hurt her foot, but ended with them having a genuine conversation and finding out they had a lot in common. It was nice to see that grand gestures are not always the right move, but sometimes something actually amazing can come out of the experience (even if it was the opposite of how you thought it might go).

In the Blink of an Eye (Elizabeth Eulberg): Not quite the trapped in a confined space trope you would think. This one involved friendship instead of romance and I actually found it so refreshing. This was more about growth and adaptation, about seeing things from another perspective, about letting go of past hurts and trying to rebuild. It also takes place in London, so it sets a perfect scene for magic.

Liberty (Anna-Marie McLemore): A short story about a cheerleader who does a makeover to gain a spot on the cheer team, but this makeover hides her culture, it fits her in to the perfect "white" cheerleader mold. This story highlights how a makeover usually hides the real you, and it is not worth it in the long run. Would you not rather be loved for who you really are, for your personality, your body, your laugh, you? The MC made herself fit into a box that was slowly destroying her, and it was not until she met another cheerleader, whose social she used to follow for beauty tips for her skin tone, that she was able to finally embrace herself. The sections were split by cheerleading moves, which was ingenious.

The Surprise Match (Sandhya Menon): Matchmaker, matchmaker, make me a match. Just don't make it my best friend who says he is in love with some other girl in our class. And now that my matchmaking app matched me with him, why am I starting to see I have romantic feelings for him? This one was super adorkable. I mean, it mentioned Heath Ledger singing in Ten Things I Hate About You and so I was immediately sold. But, better yet, it reminded me of one of my favourite 80s rom com movies Some Kind of Wonderful. So you know it was the perfect way to end this anthology.

Thank you to netgalley and the publisher for giving me access to the advanced copy of this book to read.

My library won't buy this but only because it's a tad too mature for my campus population. I loved this collection of short stories each taking on some of the most popular tropes in romance fiction.

This diverse collection of young adult love stories takes typical romantic tropes and addresses them in fun, unexpected ways with surprises for each main character. Each story is unique and contemporary with a little bit of something for everybody.

About half of these stories were a hit for me, while the other ones were a miss. My favorites were by Marissa Meyer and Sandhya Menon (not a surprise since I love their other books), but I also enjoyed the stories by Elizabeth Eulberg and Julie Murphy. The London romance was the stuff of dreams for me, for sure! The sweet romances and the quirky characters made the stories fun and relatable. Whether it's finally letting their feelings out at a school dance or on a class trip, the characters seemed so real and easy to sympathize with. I didn't care for the language used in some of the stories and I didn't personally agree with some of the views and lifestyles presented, but I can recommend this collection to anyone who enjoys diverse young adult fiction.

I voluntarily reviewed a copy of this book. A positive review was not required, and all opinions expressed are entirely my own.

Normally I’m not a huge anthology person or short story reader, but this one was great & unputdownable. Honestly it’s hard to not love anything these powerhouse authors write!

Marissa Meyer helms this delightful romance anthology alongside some of the most talented names in YA fiction such as Leah Johnson, Anna-Marie McLemore, and Caleb Roehrig. Inclusive and humorous, each contributor shares their own take on a favorite trope–fake dating, friends to lovers, one bed. I sense a perfect use of gift card money after the holidays!

Serendipity: Ten Romantic Tropes Transformed edited by Marissa Meyer features different stories by a variety of young adult authors taking on tropes. The stories are all contemporary which I appreciated. For an anthology, this book felt like a quick read. I liked most of the stories, but none made a super lasting impression and that’s okay.

Serendipity: Ten Romantic Tropes Transformed edited by Marissa Meyer features stories by a variety of young adult authors taking on tropes.

BYE BYE, PIPER BERRY BY JULIE MURPHY
Bye Bye, Piper Berry by Julie Murphy opens up Serendipity. This story’s trope is fake dating, but also friends to lovers, but officially it is listed as the fake dating trope. Piper lives next door to Gabe who is one of her best friends. Gabe is also best friends with Trevor who had been dating Piper for years, but cheats on her. And so, to get back at Trevor, Piper asks Gabe to fake date her. However, turns out there’s a spark and feelings there. Also, Gabe is fat. This story was sweet and cute and a great way to start off Serendipity.

ANYONE ELSE BUT YOU BY LEAH JOHNSON
Leah Johnson’s Anyone Else But You features the forced proximity trope. Two girls are co-presidents of their senior class. They are at Party City basically — one shows up late and what happens is they accidentally get locked in overnight. During the night, they learn different things about each other and develop feelings. This story was fun and sweet although I did end up forgetting the characters names (but also idk if it is the story’s fault as I’ve been running on no sleep lately).

THE IDIOM ALGORITHM BY ABIGAIL HING WEN
I am a sucker for Abigail Hing Wen’s writing. The Idiom Algorithm was not an exception. This story is about a boy who is dating a much richer girl from Shanghai named Rebecca. He is insistent on meeting her parents. When he happens to do so, it ends in disaster and they whisk her away to another country, England I think. So, he tries to find her via the internet and an algorithm — plus help from the girl who rents a room with her mom from his parents. The story turned out different from how I expected and I really appreciated that.

AULD ACQUAINTANCE BY CALEB ROEHRIG
Auld Acquaintance by Caleb Roehrig was a sweet addition to Serendipity. This story is about two best friends who go to a lock in on New Year’s Eve and agree to be each other’s midnight kiss if neither can find another boy to kiss them. Of course, Ollie realizes that he’s in love with his best friend, Garrett. This was an adorable story.

SHOOTING STARS BY MARISSA MEYER
Meyer’s contribution to Serendipity is Shooting Stars. This story is centered around the one bed trope. Misty has had a crush on Roman for a very long time, but she always looks like a fool around him. When their class goes on a trip to Yellowstone, she ends up somehow sharing a room with Roman that just so happens to have one bed. Y’all, this is PG13. Anyways, turns out Roman just might like her too. This was cute!

KEAGAN’S HEAVEN ON EARTH BY SARAH WINIFRED SEARLE
Keagan’s Heaven On Earth by Sarah Winifred Searle is about when a character has to sell Valentine day flowers and work the door of the school dance as a punishment. But then the character has help from a girl who is on the track team. This is told via comic strip. It was fun!

ZORA IN THE SPOTLIGHT BY ELISE BRYANT
Elise Bryant’s Zora In The Spotlight is all about the grand gesture. In this story, Zora goes to a school dance with her best friends Astrid and Jorge. Astrid is there to confront an ex. Zora is someone who is always sort of an afterthought or the supporting character to Astrid’s main character energy. However, at the dance there’s a flash mob and it is seemingly directed toward Zora. In reality — it wasn’t meant for her. I liked this short story as well.

IN A BLINK OF THE EYE BY ELIZABETH EULBERG
Forced proximity is explored in In A Blink Of The Eye by Elizabeth Eulberg. This short story follows a girl who goes to London with her show choir. She takes a ride on the eye with her best friend’s boyfriend whom she does not get along with. The reason? She had a crush on him before he started dating her best friend. Turns out there’s no chemistry there. I did like how this ended up and explored it in a different way.

LIBERTY BY ANNA-MARIE MCLEMORE
Liberty by Anna-Marie McLemore is the makeover story in Serendipity. This story follows a girl who is Latina. At first she takes pride in this but then she stops doing her makeup in a way that accentuate her features and instead tries to look white in order to make the cheerleading squad. Then her idol, Camila joins the squad and Camila does not hide the fact that she’s Latina. She leans into it completely. This story was okay. I remember parts of it, but not the main character’s name at this point and it’s only been two days since I read it.

THE SURPRISE MATCH BY SANDHYA MENON
The final story in Serendipity is The Surprise Match by Sandhya Menon. This takes on the matchmaker trope. It is about Rosie who has this best friend who asks her to find his match. So, she runs the algorithm and it turns out to be her. She lies to him and says it is someone else but then is consumed by jealousy because she really does like him. This story was a nice conclusion and well paced.

I was struggling with giving this 2 stars until I saw other people's reviews and realized a lot of people felt the same way. So here goes...the stories are varied in their troupe selection, short, and easy to read, but that's kinda where the variety and excitement ends. I know short stories don't allow for a ton of character development and world-building, but that's kinda the challenge and why people read them...CAN the author make a compelling character and world in x number of pages/words/chapters? When done well it is brilliant, but when it isn't as successful the stories just all end up feeling like "so what? Why am I supposed to care about a world, character, or plot that I didn't get much info about?" So while I jumped on this one for Meyer's name and the enjoyment of finding new authors through shorter anthologies like this (and the cover to be honest), it didn't open many doors for me.

Summary: Overall, I didn’t enjoy many of the stories here. I really only enjoyed 2, and the rest ranged from 1-3 stars, with only one 3 star (which you can read more about below).
Many of the stories either didn’t utilize their trope well, weren’t well written or didn’t have well developed relationships, or had ridiculous narratives or characters.

Bye Bye, Piper Berry (The Fake Relationship):
2 stars
This story’s pacing was rushed, even for a short story, and I didn’t feel any of the romance or “romantic” vibes. Both of the characters were exhibiting toxic traits (like faking a relationship just to make your ex jealous? Laughing at your ex falling off a stage into the orchestra pit?), which was all tired and outdated drama for the sake of drama. Overall I just never felt the romance or believed its development, so it got a low rating from me.

Anyone Else But You (Stranded Together):
2 stars
I did not like the love interest in this one (lame excuses for her annoying behavior), nor did I believe that these two characters would get together or that they miraculously felt anything for each other. They went from “enemies” to “friends” way too quickly, and their status as “rivals” was never really set up so none of this “development” meant anything to me, and it was very rushed and had a corny ending. Aside from that, the writing wasn’t great either. For the longest time I was wondering who the main character even was, because we were getting all this description about the love interest and their life, but not the MC and what they looked like or who they were. At least the story had a good setting/set up.

The Idiom Algorithm <I>(Class Warfare):
1 star
This was really all over the place. First off, there were so many names and characters being thrown at me at once which confused me for a long while. It’s a short story, not a novel, and stating all these different names is not smart. Then there’s just the random facts about characters that were not necessary at all except for being over handed exposition, like describing the dad putting a pot onto the stove, and then tacking on a random sentence stating that he worked in tech but his true passion was gardening. Like… okay? So? There was also a lot of poor explanations for character decisions. Then the story got incredibly overdramatic and unbelievable in terms of the rising action and full of melodrama — I can only describe it as being a hallmark movie mixed with a James Bond movie but the entire thing is satire except it doesn’t know it is. A true telenovela. Then the MC made me extremely uncomfortable, becoming obsessive over this girl and practically stalking her… then missing school and meals for her… then hacking security cameras in another country to find her… it just left a bad taste in my mouth and I don’t know anybody who would want to date this guy. Then the story ended in a very anticlimactic manner, as did the development of the central relationship.

Auld Acquaintance (The Best Friend Love Epiphany):
4.75 stars
The first story I enjoyed! I really flew through it — the author really made me ship the two characters and made their development together believable. I was able to care about them and their emotions very quickly, and I loved the setting of the story. There was just positivity in this one with a side of mistakes and flaws, and the characters and their lives felt real.

Shooting Stars (One Bed):
5 stars
This one was my favorite story! I loved the setting and concept from the get go, and again I was easily able to connect with, believe, and feel for the characters and their lives/relationship. I thought the characters were super adorable and healthy and that they made sense. And the usage (i.e. transformation) of the one bed trope was so good and unique!

Keagan’s Heaven on Earth (The Secret Admirer):
2 stars
This one was told in the form of a comic, which was super unique and cool, but I unfortunately didn’t enjoy the story. I never cared for either of the characters or really understood who they were. It was also rushed and I felt like it was missing parts, which was odd. The setting was also pretty boring and generic, as was the relationship and how they got together. Also, the trope was barely demonstrated in this story.

Zora in the Spotlight (The Grand Romantic Gesture):
2 stars
There were way too many pop culture references than I cared for in this one (which I noticed in a few of the other stories but was very evident here). The dialogue was a bit on the nose, and overall the story was cheesy, unrealistic, and the couple didn’t even know each other, so I’m not sure how this fulfilled the theme.

In a Blink of the Eye (Trapped in a Confined Space):
1 star
I’m not even sure why this short story made the cut… the trope that was used wasn’t even used, imo, accurately to the prompt? It was not a confined space at all, and the two characters “trapped” together weren’t even the main couple. It was dead a story about a girl making up with her friend’s boyfriend, like, what? The story has unbelievably cringey, on the nose dialogue, and it features insta-love/love at first sight, which was ridiculous. The story overall didn’t even have any romance in it, which was odd? The whole situation was also unrealistic, uncomfortable, and the conflict wasn’t resolved in the best way.

Liberty (The Makeover):
1 star
Another one where the trope wasn’t really used, and overall was extremely rushed in the romantic development. The MC also admits this, that her “feelings” for the love interest are just a “stupid” “celebrity crush” that was shallow, but… admitting it doesn’t make it make sense or make me care lmao. The main character’s dilemma also made me uncomfortable, what with her trying to erase her Latina features and be white to be accepted, later to be “fixed” by someone else. Also I felt it was so… odd, to have the love interest unable to perform her cheerleading routines and duties just because she’s a lesbian and hand placement. If that were a straight dude on the team, that would be the questionable behavior that many school systems use to justify the dress codes in place to protect the attention of their male students. It didn’t sit right with me. Overall the story had outdated concepts/interactions, and nothing made me actually ship the two characters or care about them.

The Surprise Match (The Matchmaker):
3 stars
I wish I enjoyed this one more. I thought that the concept was really good, but it fell flat in execution and writing style. There was a grand gesture that would’ve fit better in an earlier trope, yet it was incredibly unnecessary and unrealistic. The author was also way too heavy handed in the exposition, like, this was a line from a best friend to another: “I can’t believe you just wrote a program that would find people’s best romantic matches using info trawled from their social media profiles.” Also, don’t even get me started on the awful lingo and slang these authors think teenagers actually use in real life: like including “BTW” or “AF” in an actual verbal conversation.

That being said, I really wanted to love this collection, but unfortunately I didn’t enjoy most of the stories and thought the few that I did like didn’t make up for it, hence the rating :(

This was a great book with different Young Adult (YA) tropes in it. I think anyone who loves YA books or is wanting to try them should definitely start with this one to get a broad sense of the genres in YA.

Anthologies are one of my favorite ARC requests, and romance ones even more so. As is typical of this body of work, some of the stories were better than others and therefore this was another middle-of-the-road reads for me. One that was really good was “Keagan’s Heaven on Earth” because it was the first time I had seen a graphic novel format used in an anthology, which was really cool and exciting to read through. I’m still looking forward to an anthology that is ALL good instead of just some, though!

This is a cute YA rance anthology. As with most anthologies, some were much better than others. There is even a chapter in graphic novel form, which, while I'm not a fan, will be exciting for some readers. The representation in this book is great! Several LGBTQ couples/storylines. Overall, super cute!

I don’t have too much to say about this one if I’m honest (not because it’s bad, just because it’s an anthology and it can be hard to write reviews for them). So, I’ll just make comments about some of the stories.

Anyone Else but You: Had good pacing but towards the end, it kind of jumped and ended a little too quickly (still cute!)

The Idiom Algorithm: This one was…strange. It used the class warfare trope and I always thought that was were two kids are competing in a class project or something, but this was not that, this was one poor kid “fighting” with a rich kid (HOWEVER, this could very well be how that trope is interpreted against the background of Asian culture) There were some typos thought and it felt like things were rushed in places.

Shooting Stars: MARISSA MEYER USED THE ONE BED TROPE!! it had great pacing and teased the main event. And the perfect setting in my opinion!

“Keagan’s Heaven on Earth” this one was another strange one. IT WAS A MINI GRAPHIC NOVEL which was so cool to see and had a sapphic romance, plus sized MC and was so wholesome. However, it may have been the format of it that made it seemed rushed and, this story used the “secret admirer” trope, meaning someone anonymous is sending you stuff, and that never happened. As a matter of fact, the admirer threw the gift away.

“Liberty” was a little hard for me to understand because it dealt with cheerleading and different cheers, and I had a hard time visualizing a lot of them and I guess it didn’t…have a plot? And didn’t really go anywhere? I don’t know…but it did have a great message of just being yourself and not altering yourself to fit the mold.
The last story was written by Sandhya Menon and this was definitely a short story. It felt a little rushed and used abbreviations for words as though this was a text message and not like the characters were sitting next to each other in the car TALKING. Although, the last two scenes were pretty great.

All in all, this anthology gave me unrealistic exactions for my first flirting/intimate experience with the opposite sex and had TONS of rep from plus sized characters to LGBTQ, and BIPOC characters which was awesome to see. The stories were awesome, but some did have the issue of being rushed like all short stories, so I won’t hold that against them.

I usually enjoy reading anthologies, and I was really eager to read this book which dug into story tropes seen throughout fiction. Plus, it had a few authors that I recognized. Unfortunately, I felt like a lot of the stories didn't utilize their specific trope very well. In the end, only a couple of the short stories stood out to me

Usually short stories aren't my favorite, but I really enjoyed most of these. There were some that I liked better than others, but I really had a good time listening to this overall. (But my favorite was the Marissa Meyer one because of course it was).

This book is great for anyone looking for a quick fix of sappy rom-com moments.

Additionally, full disclosure, I listened to the finished audiobook rather than reading the provided galley due to my being behind on reviews. This review is based on that experience. I probably liked this better because I listened to it rather than tried to read it, honestly.

I am not always a fan of anthologies but this was so well edited that Myers needs to be commended for it. I loved nearly all of the stories and have recommended this to all of my friends.

I only liked about half the stories. I know these were short stories, but still, they often felt rushed. Several felt very juvenile. But quite a few were cute, and I like the way the troupes were pulled in; some very interestingly!

I have to admit, I don't recall much about turning these conventional setups on their head, but I do love how many of them are recognized and represented. Plus, look at these authors! You can't go wrong with picking and choosing if you want to show young writers what an original spin on a (potentially overdone) trope looks like.