Review: Meet Cute Diary by Emery Lee

Meet Noah. All he wants in life is romance. There's not much of that happening in his life--he's grown up as a closeted trans kid in a place where people like him aren't accepted. And so, he hits on a solution of sorts. He'll create a website filled with cute stories about how trans people met their partners in unusual circumstances and get their happy ending. The only problem is that he is claiming that the stories are all true ... and just as he moves to Denver to stay with his brother for the summer, a troll exposes his website as fraudulent. Lucky then, Noah has just has his own cute meeting with Drew, who is intrigued by the site and comes up with an idea--he and Noah will have a fake romance that they can post online, thus convincing everyone that the site is real. What could possibly go wrong?

Well, everything, including the plot. 

Unfortunately Meet Cute Diary starts out as a YA novel with a fun premise. The main character is a bit entitled, but as these things normally end with such people learning their lesson, I was willing to keep cheering for Noah. And to be fair, Noah does learn some valuable lessons. The difficulty is how this book is plotted--the plot does a bit of a one-eighty midway through. There's no build up or suggestion that this might be the case in the blurb, the cover or in the first half of the book, which feels more infuriating than entertaining. Consequently, the book feels messy and never quite packs the emotional punch that it should.

This book is interesting for its portrayal of a trans teenager, especially when the focus isn't on coming out or transitioning, but that in itself isn't enough to hold a poorly plotted story together.

Not really recommended.

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