Summer Days and Summer Nights: Twelve Love Stories

I have never been a fan of short stories or short story collections, I tend to want to get behind characters and stay with them for the long haul, I've never really loved the short snappy stories where you are just getting used to all the different people when it suddenly is at an end. I'd heard really good things though about Summer Days and Summer Nights, a collection of 12 Love Stories by some of today's best Young Adult authors and all themed around Summer that I felt I had to give it a try.

This book contains stories by such well known authors as Libba Bray, Cassandra Clare, Leigh Bardugo and Jennifer E. Smith. Some of these authors I've read books by recently and other's I have plans to delve into their books in the very near future and so I felt that the calibre of writing was high enough that we could anticipate some great stories along the way.

All of the stories are generally in a contemporary setting but some have a more paranormal or fantastical setting to them than others. Some are very much just a contemporary short love story with the theme of summer central to them whereas others are more clever in their twist on the theme of love. Along the way we meet some great characters and as I sit here reflecting back on this book, as I finished it just over a week ago, I find them coming back to me piece by piece and I'm smiling fondly as I remember the stories.

I don't think I'm a convert to the short story genre, I still find them harder to invest in but what I did enjoy was the ability to read lots of different themes and characters over the period of a few days and to keep feeling I was trying something new each time I started a new story.

I gave this 3 stars but I think fans of the short story may find it deserves more than that but for me it was a little bit of a filler between two books to give me something different but I'm not sure if in a year I'll remember any of the stories specifically.

Head, Scales, Tongue, Tail by Leigh Bardugo 2 Stars
I didn't understand this story. The first pages were irrelevant to the story and beside two or three lines I loved, I didn't get the romance.

The End of Love by Nina LaCour 3.5 Stars

Last Stand at the Cinegore by Libba Bray 2.5 stars
Super weird and not quite a believable love story to me

Sick Pleasure by Francesca Lia Block 1.5 stars
Too confusing and no real goal as for a love story imho

In Ninety Minutes, Turn North by Stephanie Perkins 4 stars
It was cute but I found Marigold a little bit unpredictable (since out of character is not quite the right term for a short story) and also stupid because of some of her descisions.

Souvenirs by Tim Federle 4.5 stars
so bittersweet. I loved the couple in this story.

Inertia by Veronica Roth 4.5 stars
I first tought: nice premise but the first pages weren't my cup of tea. But then it went the feels rollercoaster.

Love is the Last Resort by Jon Skovron 5 stars
I loved how overly ambigious the narrator was and how the strands of simple, yet cute love stories intertwined

Good Luck and Farewell by Brandy Colbert 3.5 stars
This was enjoyable and really cute but a little bit to rash for my liking. Felt a little bit ‘generic' for me

Brand New Attraction by Cassandra Clare 4 stars
This was the most story driven one of the bunch

A Thousand Ways This Could All Go Wrong by Jennifer E. Smith 5 stars
Oh my gosh. So cute, so totally up my alley.

The Map of Tiny Perfect Things by Lev Grossman 3.5 stars
It was good but super predictable. I already guessed the ending and plottwist a page into the story

My favorite one was Love Is The Last Resort. It was really cute. They were all pretty cute. Some of them made me feel like I was reading a sci-fi novel instead of a romantic short story... But that's okay because I dig sci-fi :P I enjoyed them all, and this was a good way, for me at least, to get a sense of some of these authors writing styles, as I've never read books by about 8 of these authors... Haha woops. But they were all really good, I think, minus Sick Pleasure. I kind of had to force myself to finish that story... I just couldn't get into it :/