I received this book for free from the author in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
A Series of Unfortunate Meet Cutes by Tori Alvarez, Rina Dayne, G.G. Gleason, Maria Ann Germain, Kelly Kay, Marisa Mohi, K. Rodriguez, Kathryn Trattner, Melissa Williams Published by Eternal Daydreamer Publishing on June 20, 2022
Genres: Adult Contemporary Romance, Adult Fantasy Romance, Adult Paranormal Romance, Adult Romance
Pages: 1056
Source: the author
Format: E-galley
My Rating:
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Blurb:
Right person, wrong time!
This romance anthology is full of your favorite romance subgenres: contemporary, paranormal, and fantasy! Each novella in this timeless romance anthology features a not so meet cute.
These nine authors have come together to tell stories of forbidden love, enemies to lovers, second chance romance, forced proximity, mistaken identity, office romance, and rockstar romance.
These characters may never enter the meet cute club, but there are definitely some happily ever afters!
Author’s Note:
As you begin reading this romantic anthology, you’ll notice at the end of each story blurb there is a specific rating in heart-eyes. While each title in this anthology portrays consensual intimacy, the rating is in place to help give you insight into the steam level of the stories you are about to read–and for your reading pleasure.
We hope you enjoy our collection of uniquely awkward and adorable meet-cutes and fall crazy in love over-and-over again.
Graphic sexual depictions, open door sex and explicit language
Content is recommended for an over-18 audience. This anthology contains no erotica.
Subgenres Used: Contemporary, paranormal, fantasy
Tropes Used: Second chance, small town, enemies to lovers, rockstar, forced proximity, forbidden, interracial, secret identity, & opposites attract
My Review
So I signed up for this anthology because I’ve loved the two stories I’ve read by Kelly Kay before. And that meant that I skipped ahead and first read her story, Follow Me, instead of reading straight in order. It was a bit of a rock-star romance, except the heroine was kind of a social media influencer/star in her own right. I’ve only read this author in some really hilarious rom-com stories so far, and I think that carries over into this one, although there was one part that was a little awkward for me, when during a bedroom scene he called her a funny nickname, “fairy pancake princess”. That kind of took me out of that moment. I’d have loved if he called her that at a different moment though.
After I read that, I went back and started from the beginning. First was Mi Sol, My Sun by Tori Alvarez. It wasn’t bad. Kind of predictable and seemed to drag a little for me towards the end that I kind of skimmed a bit. I did love the theme of it though, her coffee/wine bar she was opening, that was fun!
The next story was Pirate Booty by Rina Dayne. I had a few issues with some of the things in it, based on my own experiences as someone who has taught in a tiny town, to a little bit bigger town, to a suburban district, and finally to an inner city district, with the way some things happened, or were overlooked. Like the party at the beginning. Yeah, maybe no one knew names and it was a normal thing for the town, but for teachers or a school principal to take part it in and then not have it found out and they lose their job? That was a little bit hard to just gloss over. However there were other parts I liked, the characters for sure. And I loved how they rewatched season 1 of Bridgerton, because I will rewatch it, but probably never season 2 again, it was okay, just not the same.
Now, the third story was one of my favorites, Once Upon That Time I Started a Major Sh*t Show by Maria Ann Germain. Oh my gosh I was laughing so much as I read this one! I love stories that take place through diary entries or text messages, etc. Charli and Quinn had the best meet-cute for all the stories. The back and forth between those two was hilarious! I loved Charli’s snarkiness and I loved how Quinn dealt with her. I loved the friends in their group chats, they were totally the type of people I’d love to hang out with! I loved this one so much, I am now going to make sure I read more by this author!
The fourth story I also really liked. On the Rocks by G.G. Gleason had some great almost insta-love, but definitely insta-lust. It had a really unique storyline with the heroine, Skye, not liking sex. Because she’d never had a guy make it good for her. Yeah, that’s not that different from other stories you might think, but it was, you’d just have to read it yourself to see what I mean! Although I have to disagree with one thing the character thought, about a guy going down for himself meaning it wasn’t good. I disagree. In my experience it was when the guy was doing it because the woman asked him, he didn’t really like it, and then it wasn’t good.
Fifth was the Kelly Kay story that I read first. I skipped the 6th story because it was fantasy I think, and not my type, but then the 7th was one that I ended up really, really liking as well! It was called Caution in Love by K. Rodriguez. Izzy and Chase’s story was so good. It had real depth even with the bit of insta-love, and I loved the family moments and all the fun the story included even with the sad things that they had to deal with.
I skipped the 8th one, again, I think it was fantasy or paranormal, a genre I don’t read a ton of with adult romance. But the final story was really good, and the author said it will be leading to a series this summer, and I’ll be excited to check those out! It was called Throne For It by Melissa Williams. It again had a bit of insta-love to it, but hey, when you’re dealing with royalty, even just an earl, that can be forgiven in my opinion. It had funny bits as well as steamy parts, and a great storyline and meeting characters that I’ll be eager to read more in the future books.
Overall I highly recommend this little anthology and will be looking to read more by these authors myself!
Authors’ Works – Amazon Links
Tori Alvarez: The Graffiti Hearts Series & Love’s Influence https://amzn.to/3HhvcFk
Rina Dayne: Her Sweet Lips
G. G. Gleason: The Southern Sins series & many others https://amzn.to/3mGZFDh
Maria Ann Germain: The Betting series & many others
Kelly Kay: The 5 Families Vineyard series & many others https://amzn.to/3zA8lCU
Marisa Mohi: Multiple short stories https://amzn.to/3Qws1On
K. Rodriguez: Debut Author
Kathryn Trattner: Mistress of Death & many others https://amzn.to/3aTq8e2
Melissa Williams: The Caston Springs, Colorado series & many others https://amzn.to/3HkY3Zt
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This sounds just adorable!
There were lot of different stories to pick from!