For the record, I haven’t read Emma. So I didn’t know where the plot was going to go. And this was my experience reading Mismatched:

The pacing felt weird. I found it confusing, since a lot of names were tossed around since the beginning. The main things were about Evan who like to matchmaking his friends or figuring out who’s interested in who, and maintaining a safe queer community. I actually love the illustrations style, the way the colors are bright but soft and just eye pleasing to see. Also everyone got their happy ending so there’s that.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the e-arc of this book. This book was extremely cute, but I do not think it was for me. The art was amazing and it was a beautifully designed graphic novel, but I felt there were many issues with the writing. For one, I feel that the story could’ve been longer! I felt like we navigated a lot of plot in a short amount of time. I liked how Evan was redeemed in the end, but his behavior throughout the novel was not the best. In general, I just felt like everything was rushed. It was definitely a cute story, but it needed more. It almost felt unfinished in a way.

6.5/10

Gorgeous art and the colours are vivid and pleasing to look at. Lettering could be better. In the ARC copy the text is a bit too high up.

Some parts are a bit nuanced and hard to digest, tbh. Like there's a lot of things that I have to reread to fully understand and I think it should not be like that. It was a nice story, anyways. A bit predictable but it is what it is.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher who gave me an early copy of this book.

I downloaded this book to read myself, and my middle school daughter has stolen it from me. She told me that she loves it. The design and graphic novel format is so cute and really well done. I’m an upper middle school teacher, and I cannot wait to do a comparison between parts of this novel and five traditional story of Emma. My recommendation for grade level for this book would be grades 8-12.

I adored this! It was so freaking cute. I loved how Evan was an influencer, and he had such great character development throughout the story. All the characters seemed well developed and the story was chef's kiss. The artwork was gorgeous as well. Loved every second! Evan and Davi for the win!

I really enjoyed the illustration style and thought that the LGBTQ+ re-imagining was done well and freshened up the well-known story of Emma.

However, I did think that there was a lot of plot that needed to be covered in the span of this relatively short graphic novel, so at times things felt very rushed. For example, we never really meet the person Natalia ends up with and we just have to trust Evan in the beginning that she’s not a right fit for her. There were SO many characters that we couldn’t spend much time with most of them, and understandably so, but perhaps the retelling didn’t have to include every single plot point or character as the original material.

Overall, this was a fun, light read that I think will appeal to a young adult audience and I will most likely check out more work from this author.

Mismatched is a solid retelling of Jane Austen's Emma. The art is charming and the storytelling is suitably frenzied and full of twists, turns, and romantic entanglements.

Evan is far more insufferable than Emma was, and I don't know that I get why everyone circles him like moths to the flame, but by the end he's tolerable. The supporting cast is interesting and I enjoyed the read.

The art is lovely and cute. I appreciate the diversity represented with the characters. Reading queer content brings me immense joy.

I'm a fan of Jane Austen, so I was looking foward to this modern retelling. Honestly, Emma is not my favorite by Austen. A main character who believes they know better than others, despite being young and inexperienced, and making them still likable and redeemable is a tightrope act. With Mismatched I think Evan, our main character, went a little far into unlikable territory. Some of his actions were just mean spirited. I know this is following in theme with the original content. But it did not feel like he was sweet or caring enough with his closest friends. The progression of him being held accountable for his actions did not seem totally believable. He is likable and more considerate towards the end, and I did like reading it! But I was not convinced with the development. We needed more time, I think, to witness a change. I did like the ending moral to the story. And it is a happy ending! So the story ended on a sweet note.

If you are a fan of Clueless, another modern Emma retelling, you would probably enjoy reading this!

Thank you author, publisher, and NetGalley for providing me with an eARC of this book!!

I loved the vibes and the artwork is gorgeous!

I also think this also captures the vibes of Emma very well. At one point I forgot and I was like ugh bro stop acting like that the world doesn’t revolve around you and I was like…. Wait lol

This was a cute graphic novel. This book was geared towards teen agers and took place at a school. It was a a twist on Emma, and I also got Clueless vibes from it. The queer twist was interesting. The book was well written and nicely illustrated, but it just wasn't for me. I do recommend it for high schoolers though.

I had a fun time reading this! It’s a modern retelling of Jane Austen’s Emma with a gay, teen social media makeup artist and the shenanigans of high school crushes and dating. While I think it would be more enjoyable to read if you have a grasp on the original text (I didn’t) it’s still fun to read without really knowing what Austen wrote. The art style is fun and fits the story well (and I think it’ll look even better in physical print!). Because this is based off of Austen, there are a lot of plots and subplots kind of going on at once (and some of the author’s own as a lot of the characters in this book are queer and queerness is a significant aspect of a lot of the character, relationship, and plot arcs), and so it’s a little hard to feel like any one thing was fully explored. I did really enjoy getting to see Evan’s character development, and I felt pretty invested in his relationships and the other characters and their relationships. I just wish we got a little bit more, which can be hard to do in a 264-page graphic novel. But, overall, I did enjoy reading this and I think it’s worth picking up if you like queer graphic novels, a little bit of several romances, or Austen/classics retellings!

If you're going to do Austen with a twist, you have to make sure you're also twisting away enough from the adaptation that came before. A good Austen/Shakespeare/ETC with a twist makes you forget that it's a take on that base story, and make it your own. Clueless knocks that out of the park with Emma. This rings too close to Clueless to stand out to me in any way. And I find it, unfortunately, missing the charm that Clueless comes with. A queer aemma adaptation is a good premise, and there are solid bones here. But I don't find the same level of familiarity with Emma and Knightley, or Cher and Josh. I'm told what these characters feel towards each other, rather than shown. It's hard to feel invested in it, despite being excited by the premise. But it just doesn't deliver how I hoped.

I might be a smidge biased since I’m quite fond of Emma retellings…but <i>Mismatched</i> was adorable.

Anne Carlin honestly did such a fantastic job with this LGBTQIA+ retelling of Jane Austen’s Emma. The graphic novel held just the right amount of true-to-the-original plot points and uniqueness in these versions of the characters to make it a truly pure and enjoyable reading experience. I had so much fun getting to know these new sides to beloved characters and I’m honestly just so thrilled that others will have that opportunity as well.

The story is quick, the artwork is gorgeous, and the characters just as lovable. If you’re a fan of Austen retellings, I would highly recommend adding this one to your list!

MISMATCHED is a queer YA graphic novel adaptation of emma, where evan, a social media influencer and high school junior, learns that he can't control everything and everyone around him. while i love emma retellings, i think it's so easy for them to go wrong because there are so many factors at stake, but this wasn't the case for MISMATCHED. this was super fun, really cute, and an easy read, and i felt like evan learned his lesson about meddling and still got his happily ever after.

read if you like:
- emma retellings
- graphic novels
- friends to lovers

thanks to netgalley and little, brown ink for the advanced copy! MISMATCHED comes out september 3rd!

I love the unabashed queerness of this book so much! The colors used were gorgeous as well. Emma is perhaps my least favorite Austin book so the story didn’t charm me much, but I’m sure any Emma fan would enjoy it.

Very Jane Austen's Emma meets Heartstopper, in a way that actually elevates the premise of both of those works. A high school setting with a queer cast of characters and artwork similar to Heartstopper, and with the same story beats as Emma, this graphic novel occupies a very specific niche of queer YA stories that talks about queer gatekeeping and toxic positivity. I absolutely adored how Evan and Davi's families are intertwined and their wonderful dynamics with their niece. The GSA as the social circle worked so well to illustrate the ways even a queer found family can be guilty of isolating and passively gaslighting within the community. I'm always impressed with a good contemporary Austen retelling, especially if it's queer, like the movie Fire Island, and this perfectly encapsulates the essence of Emma that is at once sweet and necessary.

Although I do like a good Austen retelling, I find it harder and harder to embrace the Emma retellings. I'm not really sure why, and this one is no exception. Maybe it's that I don't think that anyone has done it as well as Clueless and so I am forever going to be comparing them. And in the case of Mismatched, I definitely did do a bit of Clueless side-by-side. Unfair it's true, but you can't help but do that when it's a book set in modern high school involving, well, a retelling of Emma.

That being said, it's a pretty enjoyable read, and if you don't know the Emma story, then you won't lose anything in this version. In fact, I think it may even make the story work better to not be trying to guess who everyone is. I certainly missed the Miss Bates character until the very end.

Evan is a generally decent teen, trying to help out even though it's more for himself than for those he is helping out. And I like that this is an inclusive read that doesn't force characters to be a certain way just for increasing the potential audience or cashing in on the Heartstopper craze.

All in all, a good graphic novel about figuring things out. A decent retelling of Emma. Definitely if you liked Heartstopper or Bloom, it's worth picking this one up too.

I was charmed by this short graphic novel. It's a retelling of Jane Austen's Emma, and it gave me all the Clueless (you remember that movie from the 90's, which was also a retelling of Emma) vibes. If you're not old enough to remember clueless just ignore that part, but seriously, the movie was delightful, but it might not have aged well, I can't remember. THIS GRAPHIC NOVEL, however, is fun. The art and color theme is very candy coated without being too overly sweet. I would have loved a little more backstory and depth on the many many characters because some of them do come off as a little one note, but it's tough to do that in the space of a graphic novel.

I knew the story so I knew where the story was going, but I still enjoyed it. It was lovely little piece of romance.

This was a very cute Emma retelling. I do think you need to be familiar with the source material to fully appreciated this one though. There were some parts that didn't flow super well, and the full growth of the MC wasn't super apparent. I would still probably recommend this one, but it is not a new favorite.

I haven't read Emma, and I don't think I need to to know it doesn't translate well to modern day times.

Retelling aside, this was very boring and choppy. Scenes would abruptly end and become something completely different, and without any chapter markers. Each character was flat and stereotypical, so it was hard to care about any of them, and a story like emma really hinges on the characters and their love lines.

Also, I love pride representation in books, but it felt so forced and awkward and, again, stereotypical. This one's a miss for me.