Emery Lee (2)

As someone who was a big fan fiction reader and Tumblr user as a teenager, the entire premise of this book is one that I absolutely would have been all over at Noah's age, as much as I might have denied it at the time. Lee perfectly captures the yearning for love (or at least for a partner) that chronically-online teens experience as a reaction to an environment that doesn't seem to love them all that much. Everything about Lee's world feels real, teenage exaggeration and all, and while the show more story itself is mostly lighthearted, not everything is too smooth-going for the characters to make it feel unnatural.

I think the main thing that held me back from giving this five stars is Noah himself. He starts off the book with an understandably sour attitude, and it's clear from the beginning that he's incredibly self-absorbed, more so than you'd expect from a teenager. While this fades as the story goes on, I found him to be an unlikable protagonist - that isn't to say it's a bad thing; it just changed the tone of the story for me, and made his contrast with Devin all that more stark. I would have liked to maybe see more glimpses of Noah's best qualities earlier on in the book, because as it is, we don't really get that until maybe the last third of the story.

This is a very cute read that I'd recommend for anyone who likes solid, diverse YA romance. It's great to know that trans kids have stories like this to see other trans kids finding love and acceptance, even if it's not some grand love story. show less

Noah’s entitlement, shallowness, and childish rudeness could be grating. It wasn’t fun, catty meanness when he was being judgmental and nasty to someone who only seemed to be sweet and genuine or to people who were supportive and giving a lot to him. He was a teenager, and it felt like age-appropriate behavior. And, obviously, it was the setup for his character development, but I don’t know if he really changed enough for me to not still be put off by it at the end of the book. Noah show more never really did become a better friend to Becca. He wasn’t doing anything really horrible; he just never stopped doing the same things that drove her away (making everything about himself, snapping at her instead of dealing with his own emotions). To some degree, it probably felt like that because this is Noah’s story. But they had a conversation about how one-sided their friendship had become; Noah agreed it was a problem, but then it was right back to her doing grand gestures for him with no reciprocation. Nothing was any better for her. There must have been some way to show actual change from Noah in that relationship if that was the intent. At least in Noah’s relationship with Devin, it started to feel a little more even though e still had to be a lot more mature, patient, and giving all the time than Noah ever managed in return.
Despite the cute cover and setup, this story was more about toxic relationships and developing realistic expectations and boundaries for romantic relationships than it was about the fluffy side of romance. That definitely contributed to my sense that Noah’s toxic behaviors weren’t addressed as well as they should have been. Drew was blatant in his creepiness – he’s manipulative, he was jealous and controlling, he disregarded Noah’s interests and feelings. He used the fake dating scenario to push their relationship forward without talking about it or setting boundaries, to get Noah to accept things he was uncomfortable with, and to make Noah feel trapped. Noah was inexperienced, yearning, and definitely had some level of fear that he wouldn’t find love, so he was willing to fit everything Drew did into the script he’d created for How Romance Should Go, whether or not he was actually happy. I found that to be written fairly well. Drew is no master manipulator or villain; he’s just also a self-absorbed asshole who keeps leaning into it until he goes from kind of creepy to emotionally abusive. But if the story was all about figuring out what is acceptable and healthy in a relationship, I wanted that to come through as strongly in all the relationships.
For the queer representation, I did appreciate the more complicated gender journey we saw from Devin. Noah seemed to have had a pretty straightforward relationship with his gender – he’s a binary trans boy who came out as such and started transitioning before the story began. Devin, on the other hand, had come out as a trans girl at first before realizing that didn’t feel quite right for em. E started the story using he/him pronouns and later experimented with they/them and neopronouns as well as with eir gender presentation. Through em, there was a conversation about the unique discomfort and confusion of coming out as one thing before realizing it’s wrong and struggling with where to go from there. show less

3.5 rounded up (because I'm a soft)

I thought a lot before reviewing this book. The biggest problem here it's an author that clearly don't like teenagers writing about one. The author thinks that teenagers are dumb, self-centered and horrible people, so this is how Noah behaves. I think the book could be perfect if only the main character was a little more relatable. I don't know a lot of people this egostitical. The characters are inconsistent and very superficial, we have a small circle and show more it's kind of strange since Noah is so outgoing.
But, this IS a first book, so I was expecting for some not-so-good things, and I was surprised by the good things!
Pronouns: It was SO easy! I loved how the author showed us how easy it is to understand and use different kinds of pronouns and I was so happy everytime Devin changed em's, it was so organic incorporated that you didn't actually fells any confusion. I think, since this is a book mostly for teenagers, that it's a great way to show how pronouns are easy to respect and understand, very lovable.
I didn't liked what happened to Drew, I kind of understand that where he growed up and everything that was going on with him could give a much better end to his story, and I kind of hope that Emery comes back to him sometime and gives him a happy ending.
Noah, overall, was a piece of shit most of the time, BUT, he wasn't the WORST piece of shit, he was meh. I didn't like him, I didn't understand him, but I didn't HATE him, not how I hated Jeremy from MTBMW or Jay from Jay's Gay Agenda, so I was ok with how everything wraped up for him.
This was a cute book about cute teens (and Noah) and I think it's a great book to young trans/nb people, mostly 12-15 years old, so they can see themselves represented and their friends can learn how to respect and support them the right way. show less

**An ARC of this book was provided to me by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.**

Meet Cute Diary takes rom-coms to another level. Dealing with the ups and downs of platonic and romantic relationships on top of exploring gender and defending against transphobia and internet trolls? Yes, all of that please!! Stubborn and fierce Noah was a joy to read the POV of, and it was heartbreaking watching him push Becca away and lose himself and his boundaries all for a rose-tinted idea of what show more romance is. I have never wanted to punch a fictional character more than Drew. It was horrifying watching Noah fall for classic abuser manipulation tactics, and seeing all of his cracks where he clearly didn't even respect Noah as a person made me want to cry, even as I continued to torture myself with his presence as I just had to see Noah pull through. I do wish that Emery would have condemned some of Drew's actions a bit more, but it is what is it I guess.

I'm so happy that this message of not only acceptance or meet cutes, but of love and hope, is going out into the world. It's books like these that I wish I had available to me while growing up. show less