| Title | : | How They Met, and Other Stories |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 037584886X |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780375848865 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Hardcover |
| Number of Pages | : | 244 |
| Publication | : | First published January 8, 2008 |
| Awards | : | Lambda Literary Award LBGT Childrens/Young Adult (2008), Margaret A. Edwards Award (2016) |
How They Met, and Other Stories Reviews
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When I picked up this book, I wasn't expected it to be about gay relationships (there are some straight stories though), but I felt like I shouldn't put it down. Reading the story's, I usually had to wait until a page in to figure out if the narrator was a boy or a girl, which made me realize how love is love and a crush is a crush no matter your preferance. While there were some parts in the book where I cringed, there were others were I laughed. And although I am straight, I found myself relating to the narrators on many levels. This is a book I think people should read.
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"Starbucks Boy": Hilarious, clever, and sweet. 5/5
"Miss Lucy Had A Steamboat": I didn't really get this one, but I THINK it's about how one should respond to getting one's heart broken. 3/5.
"The Alumni Interview": Interviews for colleges are always varying degrees of awful. Add to it the awkwardness of the interviewer being your boyfriend's father and everything gets hilarious but even more awful. 5/5.
"The Good Witch": Painful prom story. 3/5.
"The Escalator, a Love Story": Rather meh. 3/5.
"The Number of People Who Meet on Airplanes": is apparently a whole lot more than anyone guessed. A little disjointed but fun. 4/5.
"Andrew Chang": Another painful prom story. 3/5.
"Flirting With Waiters": Not what I expected it to be (less flirting than I thought as well). People acted like HUMAN BEINGS in it. 4/5.
"Lost Sometimes": A VERY painful prom story. 3/5.
"Princes": I like stories with lots of dancing. Also the little bro was legit. 4/5.
"Breaking and Entering": I was expecting more than a "Sometimes you just have to let go" moral. 4/5.
"Skipping The Prom": BORING. 2/5.
"A Romantic Inclination": Entertaining but a little heartless. 3/5.
"What A Song Can Do": One of my favorites! Lots of in-story assumptions are destroyed. 5/5
"Without Saying": VERY VERY CONFUSING BUT I LIKE IT. SUBJECTIVE RATING< LOL: 4/5.
"How They Met": What it says on the can. 3/5.
"Memory Dance": Absurdly cute. 4/5.
"Intersection": What it says on the can. 3/5.
"Intersection": -
I’m exactly not sure why I thought I would like this book. It's a short story collection centred around love and I don’t like romance. I can handle it as a subplot if it’s done well but this is quite clearly a book all about romance. A book containing 15+ stories involving romance. I don’t know what I was thinking.
Surprisingly, I didn’t hate it. I didn’t love it or anything but it was bearable. It started off really interesting. By the fifth story though I was kind of sick of reading about love, as one would expect from me. Even ignoring the fact that I don’t like romance after a while the stories started getting repetitive. All the character’s sort of jumbled and I can barely remember what half of the stories were about only a week after reading it.
I liked the first few stories the most (“Starbucks Boy” and “Miss Lucy had a Steamboat” were my faves) but I don’t know if that’s because I read them first or if they were actually good. If I read one of the later stories at the beginning would I have liked it more? I’m just not sure.
I suppose I should have spread this book out more than I did and read a story a day instead of trying to plow through it. Honestly, I just wanted to be done with it. There’s nothing fundamentally wrong with it, my problems with this book all have to do with my stupidity. So, if you like romance give this one a go, if not maybe learn from my mistakes and stay clear. -
Disclaimer -- I LOVE THIS MAN!! Every book I've read of Levithan has touched my heart. This collection of short stories began, he says, as a way to avoid an AP physics lesson. That story, "A Romantic Inclination," is so funny.
Levithan's characters search for someone to love...he believes in the power of love.
Favorite line: "every two people cause an intersection. Every person alters the world." -
This review appears on
Happy Indulgence. Check it out for more reviews!
When you think about a book about romance, you think sweet, fluffy, fuzzy and emotional. But How They Met and Other Stories covered a whole spectrum of scenarios featuring love, not romance, from the closet gay, the unrequited love, the gay guy who is dating a female just for the sake of it, people who are just meant to be or couples who are just dating for the now. Most of these are teenagers, with the prom being a common scenario. When I realised the commonality between the stories early on, I got excited and thought it was all going to link together, but unfortunately this wasn’t the case.
Due to the short story format however, I couldn’t really connect to any of the characters. This is a common problem that I have with anthologies and novellas. I can’t just start from a random point in time that will end in another random point in time, without giving me time to become emotionally invested in a character, so they become fleeting. When I reached the end of How They Met, I ended up thinking….so what? I realise the point of the book is to capture different scenarios for romance, that someone out there can relate to. But this didn’t really work for me, because I couldn’t end up connecting.
I also don’t think David Levithan’s writing is for me .The first book I read of his, Two Boys Kissing, was memorable and monumental for what it was, but I felt like it was like BLARING HORNS in my face like “we’re gay and it’s okay!!!” Now I realise that’s the author’s style. Everything seems to be over emphasised and in your face, he can get rather deep at times but this seems to muddy the plot and the point for me.
Considering how this book is now 7 years old, perhaps times were different back then. We’ve progressed so much with LGBT and diverse fiction in those years, where I feel like it’s advanced to a point where it can be applied subtly with effect (such as More Than This by Patrick Ness). Perhaps back then, the author needed to tackle the topic with guns blazing. But I just feel like it’s too IN YOUR FACE now.
I received a review copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. -
"Starbucks Boy" : Sweet, endearing, Arabella was awesome. Made me crave for coffee. 4/5
"Miss Lucy Had A Steamboat" : A complicated one, with twists and turns. A girl who is dealing -in her own way- with having her heart broken. Beautifully written. 3/5
"The Alumni Interview" : I especially loved the ending, it shows the need to stand out for yourself and for the people you love, no matter what (or who) is in front of you. 4/5
"The Good Witch" : Kind of funny, but also kind of boring. 3/5
"The Escalator, a Love Story" : So sweet and corky. Loved the ending. 3/5
"The Number of People Who Meet on Airplanes" : One of the best stories in the book. Original, rather mysterious and thought-provocking. 5/5
"Andrew Chang" : Just... Poor Andrew. I hope he's doing okay, wherever he is. 2/5
"Flirting With Waiters" : Not that flirty, it made me feel like I was a young teenage gay boy, in love with a guy who was 5 years older than me. Nostalgic and full of awwww moments. 3/5
"Lost Sometimes" : Painful, highly sensual, and depressing in a good sort of way. 5/5
"Princes" : Hell of predictable, but it dealt with brothers and dance. So I loved it. My favourite one in the book. 5/5
"Breaking and Entering" : The story was too short for this type of moral. I wouldn't have minded a couple extra pages. But it felt real and really raw, so that's a plus. 3,5/5
"Skipping the Prom" : Beautiful and filled with melancholia. 4/5
"A Romantic Inclination" : Nerdy and awkward but also soulless and somehow robotic. 2/5
"What A Song Can Do" : PERFECT STORY IS PERFECT. 5/5
"Without Saying" : Boring and really not that endearing. 1/5
"How They Met" : A tender story, so beautiful that you just want someone to read it to you, over and over again, while you're dreaming about the person you love. 4/5
"Memory Dance" : Cute but forgettable. 2/5
"Intersection" : Just about the same as the previous one. 2/5 -
I highly recommend this book. Not just for YAs, but for anyone who enjoys a good story about love. As explained in his author's note, each story was written for friends on Valentine's Day, and are for the most part in their original format (the tradition began when the author was in high school). Some of the stories will make you laugh, and some will make you sad, but all are completely enjoyable.
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"Love doesn’t have to be on Valentine’s Day. It doesn’t have to be by the time you turn eighteen or thirty-three or fifty-nine. It doesn’t have to conform to whatever is usual. It doesn’t have to be kismet at once, or rhapsody by the third day.
It just has to be. In time. In place. In spirt.
It just has to be."
4.5 stars, to be more specific. How They Met And Other Stories is basically a collection of different love stories; a story of romance between a boy and a girl, a heartbreaking tale of two boys, the unrequited love of one girl to another girl, and a lot more. How They Met And Other Stories is a perfect short novel that speaks of love, heartbreak, moving on, hope and memories.
A very chill read. Easy and fast. What I loved about the book was that it was a compilation of several unrelated chapters, so you could easily manage to sneak a couple of stories every now and then during study breaks or something. Also, although some stories were very short--only 6 or 10 pages long, I thought those stories were pretty much still very worthwhile reads. I loved how every story had its own unique elements that made the stories work. Also, every story also had its own plot, be it very simple, or very common, or something entirely unique.
My top 3 favorite stories would definitely be Princes, A Romantic Inclination, and What A Song Can Do. "Princes" has a very cute 'surprise' at the end of the story. "A Romantic Inclination" is a sure seller for geeks. "What A Song Can Do" included poems and I loooooove poems.
Overall, a really fantastic, quick read!"Every two people causse an intersection.
Every person alters the world." -
David Levithan did a good job with this collection of short stories. They're all about love, different kinds of teenage loves, and they definitely remind me of my teen relationships -- though I think the girl who plays with her lesbian/bisexual best friend's heart and will never quite get the signals unmixed is a pretty ubiquitous one. Still, there's defiant we're-gay-so-what love, dating because it's familiar and convenient love, bittersweet love... There are love stories with two boys, two girls, a girl and a boy, a man and a woman...
It's a lovely collection; it touched my heart and made me smile. -
This book was a collection of short stories. Stories about relationships, heartbreak, disappointments and of course happy endings. Most of them were stories of same sex relationships. Some are straight stories but most of them were about you know lgbt's. Suprisingly i enjoyed these stories. I particularly love the story The number of people who meet on airplanes, i love this story. Also some stories about prom's are good.
This was a good read to start the new year. Cheers! -
1. Starbucks Boy - 4/5 stars!
2. Miss Lucy Had A Steamboat - 3.75/5 stars!
3. The Alumni Interview - 4/5 stars!
4. The Good Witch - 3/5 stars!
5. The Escalator, a Love Story - 2/5 stars!
6. The Number of People Who Meet on Airplanes - 4/5 stars!
7. Andrew Chang - 2.5/5 stars!
8. Flirting With Waiters - 2.75/5 stars!
9. Lost Sometimes - 2.75/5 stars!
10. Princes - 4/5 stars!
11. Breaking and Entering - 3.25/5 stars!
12. Skipping The Prom -2.75/5 stars!
13. A Romantic Inclination - 3.5/5 stars!
14. What A Song Can Do - 2/5 stars!
15. Without Saying - 2/5 stars!
16. How They Met - 3/5 stars!
17. Memory Dance - 2/5 stars!
18. Intersection - 3/5 stars! -
I thought that this was a brilliant book. Oftentimes, I felt that these characters were real people that were writing their own stories. Stories that will now live on, whether in fame or infamy. I didn't find myself bothered by the fact that many of the stories were about homosexual relationships. In fact, as one reader has already said, it really does make you realize that love is a universal thing. Love is love is love and it doesn't matter how the parties associate themselves, all that matters is the love.
I find myself loving Levithan's writings more and more as I continue to read my way through his stories and books. I thought that one of the best stories was "Princes." This story was amazing to me because it seemed so real and somewhat raw. I loved that it had the gambit of emotions and values. It went from lust to love, from pain to happiness, and even threw in some brotherly kindness and caring as well. I must admit that I'm partial to these kinds of stories; but, I think that this is one of the best ways to tell them. Some people might not like the collection of stories format; but, this one works and does it well. From the first story, I was wishing that each story was an entire book. I wanted to learn about these characters even more.
With that all being said, there were a few towards the end that I couldn't get through very well. "A Romantic Inclination" was good but a little too silly for me to follow along. "Without Saying" was especially difficult for me simply because of the 3rd person and the narration style. I thought that the characters could've been better outlined in that; but, I just plowed through it and tried to move on.
Definitely a 5/5 though for the heart-warming stories and the longing for what these characters have, even if they don't have the exact same leanings in the relationship department, they are longing for the same thing as me and most of the people on this planet - someone to love. -
Overall rating: 3.5/5
This is an interesting and rather mixed anthology. I've liked David Levithan's stories in the past - particularly The Quiz Bowl Antichrist, from
Geektastic, which sadly doesn't appear here - and I was curious to see more of them. But this was more of a mixed bag than I thought it would be. There were some gems, don't get me wrong, but none of them were as good as The Quiz Bowl Antichrist - a lot of them felt under-edited, or like they had pointless plots. There seems to be a general theme throughout the anthology of admiring someone from afar - sometimes, the admiring is eventually answered, sometimes not.
The biggest thing that bothered me was that Levithan seems to have a standard protagonist and voice that he defaults to. If you've read
Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist,
Ely and Naomi's No-Kiss List,
Dash and Lily's Book of Dares,
Every Day, or
The Lover's Dictionary, you're already familiar with him. It's an interesting protagonist, and a well-defined voice, and I don't generally mind it too much in individual novels. But with roughly 14 stories starring variations on the same protagonists, it gets a bit repetitive.
That said, not all of the stories were bad. I'm making it seem like I disliked this anthology overall, but I actually liked quite a few of the stories. Here's a breakdown:
Starbucks Boy: Not much of a conflict, but I liked the writing, and Arabella was kinda cute. 4/5
Miss Lucy Had a Steamboat: This one had a great narrator - she definitely broke the pattern that a lot of other narrators in this story set - but it relied too much on narrative summary for my taste. 3/5
The Alumni Interview: Very well-written, with a wry sense of humor, and excellent brevity. 5/5
The Escalator, A Love Story: A very well-written free-verse. 5/5
The Number of People Who Meet on Airplanes: Probably my least favorite story here. It was ridiculously sappy, with a generic narrator and no conflict. 2/5
Andrew Chang: Not very memorable - the protagonist was alright, but the plot was nothing to write home about. 3/5
Flirting with Waiters: The narrator's obsession with a not-at-all exceptional delivery guy was tiresome and bland. 2/5
Lost Sometimes: 5/5
So, here's where I actually have to write a bunch.
I first read this story when it appeared in
21 Proms, which I read over a year ago. Here was my opinion of that story, exactly as it appeared in the original review:Lost Sometimes by David Levithan: 3/5
This was a bit of a bizarre experience to read, if only because it was so radically different from Levithan's other work. (I'm a big Levithan fan, both in terms of short fiction and full novels.) Levithan's work is normally sort of fun and light-hearted, and that was present here, but it felt strained, like Levithan felt like it was obligatory. It was also bizarre in that the characters sort of sucked. (I mean that in both the figurative and the literal sense.) The narrator was the only one we really got to know, and he was a gay stereotype, the kind you'd think Levithan would want to avoid. I'm giving him a little leniency, since Levithan is gay himself, but it was still a little annoying. Also, there was no plot. It was almost entirely the narrator and his boyfriend doing it, which made for an off-putting reading experience. It had its positives - the writing was good, and it was a nice exploration of the need for sex - but it was so weird and bizarre that I couldn't really enjoy it.
But since then, I've actually started liking the story a lot better. I don't see the narrator as a gay stereotype anymore - he's a little sex-driven, sure, but it feels natural and organic. And I'm less off-put by it now; having read it again, the weirdness of the concept isn't as striking. The narrator is a very realistic person, and I enjoyed his arc throughout the story. In fact, I'd label this as my favorite story here.
Princes: Levithan seems to change his mind about what he wants to write about halfway through, but other than that, it's exceptionally realistic and interesting. 4/5
Breaking and Entering: I wish it had been a bit longer, but the voice stood out, and I liked the melodrama of it. 4/5
Skipping the Prom: Another unmemorable one. This one fell back quite heavily on Levithan's generic narrator, and while the writing was pretty good, the story was nothing special. 3/5
A Romantic Inclination: I wish there was less narrative summary, but I liked the premise of the story. 4/5
What A Song Can Do: Another free-verse poem, and although I didn't like this one quite as much, it was still well-written. 4/5
Without Saying: I wish things had been a bit more fleshed out, but it was a good experimental piece. 4/5
How They Met: The format felt more like a gimmick than real experimentation, and the story wasn't that interesting. 3/5
Memory Dance: I liked the writing, but the story didn't have much of a point to it. 3/5
Intersection: Another one that relied too much on narrative summary, with an otherwise good premise. 4/5
The overall average comes out to 3.65/5. If you're interested in David Levithan, there are far better places to start - I'd recommend
Every Day or
Love is the Higher Law. -
Wholesome little love stories!
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It bothers me that this book has actually good ratings on Goodreads. I'm losing hope in humanity (kidding). The writing was sloppy and shallow. Good thing the author indicated that he wrote the stories during high school. If not, I would lose my respect for Levithan as a writer. I loved Every Day which is why I was sort of expecting I would like this book as well. I didn't. The stories were awkward to read. Though I get what Levithan was trying to say, he was not able to convey it properly. Most of the stories happen a bit too fast. The transitions were weird. The only thing that kept me going while reading the book was the hope that I'll come across something as good as what most people say about it. Hence, I was really disappointed.
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I started this book thinking it would be a bunch of cute little love story of the usual kind. But I got a little bit of a surprise to find out the first story was about a gay boy. But I can live with some of that mixed in, I kept reading to find that out of 18 stories, 8 focused on gays or lesbians.
But they are all cute little stories about finding love and are worth the quick read. Some of my favorites (probably because they remind me of my self) are A Romantic Inclination and Without Saying. -
It's a matter of preference. I have nothing against the writing nor the stories, but it all comes down to whether I enjoyed reading it or not. It's the latter. Suffice to say, I'm a conventional kind of girl I guess :)
I really loved the airplane story though. That was my favorite and it had my heart all gooey! The Romantic Inclinations was a good one too! -
Some of these were great, some didn't interest me at all. My rating is more like 3.5 but I'm feeling generous and rounding it up to 4. Imo, there wasn't enough lesbians. If I remember correctly there was one lesbian story and it ended badly for the couple, whereas there were plenty of gay and hetero couples and idk there could have been more lesbians is all I'm saying.
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A cute selection of short love stories of all types. Some were a little odd or dull, but generally they were really endearing and enjoyable. Plus, great to see gay relationships explored as well as straight ones.
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No. I understand this was his earlier work, much of which he said he did not re-edit for publishing purposes. But man, he probably should have.
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VIDEO RESEÑA:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D0Coc... -
This collection of stories about love isn't my favorite of Levithan's books—I think his particular explorations of emotion and connection work best for me when they're novel-length. But because I already like his work, I'm glad I read this book, which does have its share of excellent moments. The eighteen stories collected here (most of which are prose but some of which are free verse) center, mostly, around young love (or young lust, or young heartbreak), both straight and queer. Levithan's narrators tend to be introspective, articulate, and self-aware, which I guess could be annoying, but which I actually really like: they're thoughtful and observant in a way that feels real to me, or close enough to real.
I like that this book isn't all about first meetings and first dates, though those do feature in some of these stories. But there are also prom nights and break-ups and friendships and almost-relationships that don't go anywhere and almost-relationships that might. There are stories that are about family dynamics almost as much as they are about romantic relationships, including a few coming-out stories. There are stories about bravery and hope as much as about love.
My two favorite stories in the book both ended up being about boys dating boys and dealing with family dynamics: these stories are about love but also about bravery and growing up and speaking up, figuring things out, and that broader reach is something I think Levithan does well. One of my favorites is "Alumni Interview," which starts like this: "It is never easy to have a college interview with your closeted boyfriend's father" (51). You can probably guess how that ones goes. My other favorite is "Princes," which I love for its New York-ness (the block of Broadway between Prince and Spring where Scholastic is, the Housing Works bookstore/café around the block on Crosby) but also for its dancer protagonist and his narrative voice, for passages like this:When you're a boy dancer, your progression through the Nutcracker is like this: First you're a mouse, then you're a Spaniard, then you're a prince. I could feel my body changing that way, from something cute and playful to something strange and foreign, then something approaching beauty. You start off wanting to be a snowflake, to be a character. But then you realize you can be the movement itself. (131)
And this:Practice was different now. He would touch me, guide me, manipulate me into the right contours, and the shape of his vision. I was used to this, but not in this way. This was not the Nutcracker. This was personal. I was prince now of a kingdom that was still being defined. (137)
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God, I loved this book. I laughed, I cried. So many sweet, beautiful, heart-breaking stories about love and relationships.
Recently I picked up How They Met which is a short story collection about love. There are 18 stories and the thing that I love most about this collection is how varied the stories are. They're all about love, yes, but so many different types of love. There are gentle, sweet stories. There is all-consuming and passionate stories. Some are sad, some are just beautiful.
I have to be honest, the reason I finally picked this collection of short stories up to read is because I had read David Levithan's short story Miss Lucy Had a Steamboat which appeared in the anthology Love Hurts by Malorie Blackman. I read that and I thought, wow this is a well-put together story and had great characters and a central relationship. And that was the push that I needed.
And I really do love the mixture of stories that appear. I love that some of the stories are just at the beginning of a love story in which there is fizzle and chemistry and others are in that comfortable we've been together ages middle and some show that some people aren't quite meant to be together.
I loved all of the stories (except one) and I loved the not knowing that happened whenever I started a new story. At times I didn't know the gender of the main character for each story and I was surprised at least once when a straight couple appeared instead of another wonderful LGBT couple that I (wrongly) assumed all the stories would be about. But what didn't surprise me was the stunning use of language in all of these stories. David Levithan has the gift of really beautiful writing.
What a lovely, romantic collection of stories! -
I'm on a Levithan kick at the moment - can you tell?
Like John Irving, Levithan includes a few common ingredients into most of his works. But instead of Austria and bears and incest, it's Jewishness, queerness, music, lust, and love.
Levithan is a 'true' YA writer, even in short stories managing to show us those moments of transition when a young character's world expands, when change is imminent. He captures adolescent moments of missed connections and almost-missed connections so vividly that you can feel the characters' butterflies and breath-catching. He weaves tales of connections made that are intense and all-encompassing in the moment, and no less important for their evanescence. Levithan speaks to anyone who has ever felt like every song on the radio is about them, and like a single night is the entire world. -
I have always admired how David Levithan can weave words together in such a beautiful and poetic way. The first book I ever read by him was the realm of possibility and I will never forget how much it touched me, so it is difficult for any of his other books to live up to how much I loved that book of poems.
"How they met and other Stories" made me feel that magical "butterflies in the stomach" type of love of first crushes, first kisses and first dates.
I loved how in each story the relationships varied significantly between boy meets boy, to boy meets girl, to girl meets girl. I just felt like I could befriend each and every character.
"The sky is so dark that all the lights are magical. It is late in the hour, late in the night, late in the year. And yet the air is filled with beginnings -- sweet, giddy lightness and the languid feel of clocks at rest." pg 242-243 -
I enjoyed the writing more than I did the stories. David Levithan has a way with words that will make you feel all sorts of emotions.
Favorite quotes:
"I wasn't letting go of love or sex or the idea of companionship. I was just rejecting the package in which it was being sold to me."
"Some people find happily ever after in being part of a couple, and for them, I say, good for you. But that's no reason we should all have to do it. That's no reason that every goddamn song and story has to say we should."
"We were trapped in the limbo between where we were and where we wanted to be. The limbo of our age."
"It's not the easy things that let you get to know a person." -
This is an amazing book, one that all should read. It is a collection of short stories about people, relationships, that are not connected, but somehow intertwined. Levithan proves once again why he is a master story-teller. This book is one everyone should read, regardless of age, gender, creed, sexuality, or anything else.
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Every two people cause an intersection. Every person alters the world.
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I have an exam tomorrow early morning. But I don't regret gulping this up one bit.
Full review to follow! -
Lovely stories :)
