My True Love Gave to Me: Twelve Holiday Stories

This is my first anthology and I don't think I like them. I realized that having multiple short stories actually slowed down my reading progress. If I had a few minutes here and there where I would typically read a page or two, I wouldn't end up reading this book because I didn't want to start a new story and not finish it. I didn't completely finish the book because I gave up on the last 3 stories, but there were a few that I really enjoyed, especially The Lady and The Fox. Many of the stories felt like rushed novels with characters that I didn't feel connected to. Short stories have a very special vibe to them and most of these stories, with the exception of Kelly Link's addition, just felt like rushed novels and not actual short stories. The idea of this anthology is sweet but I didn't love the actual result.

A book of short stories by popular YA authors. Every story is centered around romance and the holidays, so it’s a great read to get you in the holiday spirit. Several stories were a bit more magical than I usually read, but because they were short and not too fantastical and involved, I still enjoyed reading them.

I was expecting this to be amazing, as it was all the rage on Book Tube this Christmas. It also has several very popular authors. However; it just fell short for me. I think some of the stories were really cute. I was actually surprised with some of the ones I thought I would not like as they were the ones I enjoyed. I say this since I was not a fan of the authors previous works that I have read.Midnights: Awe! So cute! This took me back to all of the New Year's Eve parties we had in High School. I enjoyed it! DNF second one. Angels in the snow was ok but I wish there was more to the ending.I found myself not being able to finish this. I may pick it up again next holiday season or when I want to read something quick.

I listened to this on a road trip last week and was very happy with it. I'm not a fan of short stories, but Rainbow Rowell was all it took. I will read/listen to everything she writes. I didn't like every story, but the majority were good. 4

I enjoyed this collection. It was a good way to get introduced to a lot of YA authors I'd never read before. Rainbow Rowell's story, "Midnights," was the reason I checked this book out from the library, and it did not disappoint--it was very sweet and cute. The other stand outs, for me, were "The Lady and the Fox" by Kelly Link, and "Welcome to Christmas, CA" by Kiersten White.On the next tier were "Angels in the Snow" by Matt de la Pena, "It's a Yuletide Miracle, Charlie Brown" by Stephanie Perkins, "Krampuslauf" by Holly Black, and "The Girl Who Woke the Dreamer" by Laini Taylor.The other stories weren't really very good, but they were still good holiday fun.

This is a collection of winter/holiday themed short stories (generally about 30 pages each) by different young adult authors. I really enjoyed the stories, and whether you like all of them or not, you will definitely find at least one that you will enjoy.

Midnights by Rainbow Rowell 4.5/5Let's be honest. This story is the entire reason I read this book. It was a very cute New Years' story told over multiple years. Like all of Rainbow's other stories, it's cute, funny, witty, with very believable characters that are well-developed given the limited space.The Lady and the Fox by Kelly Link 3/5This was a strange one, and it took me awhile to get a feel for it. Probably my favorite of the fantasy stories.Angels in the Snow by Matt de la Pena 4/5Polaris is Where You'll Find Me by Jenny Han 2.5/5This is probably the wrong complaint to make about a holiday story, but the North Pole/Elves/Santa was just a bit too much Christmas for me.It's a Yuletide Miracle, Charlie Brown by Stephanie Perkins 4/5OMG, adorable lumberjack alert. This story was so cute.Your Temporary Santa by David Levithan 2.5/5Krampuslauf by Holly Black 3/5What the Hell Have You Done, Sophie Roth? by Gayle Forman 1.5/5I almost quit this story before I finished. Forman throws every single cliche she's ever heard about the Midwest into this story about a Brooklyn girl feeling isolated at a rural Midwestern university. I had to tell myself over and over and over that the snobby, judge-y tone was the point of the story, and indeed Sophie realizes this by the end, but it's not believable.Beer Buckets and Baby Jesus by Myra McIntire 2.5/5Welcome to Christmas, CA by Kiersten White 4/5Star of Bethlehem by Ally Carter 3.5/5I liked the first half of the story much better than the second half. The reason the main character was running away was not what I was expecting.The Girl Who Woke the Dreamer by Laini Taylor 2.5/5Also, why was the Rainbow Rowell New Years' Eve story first? Seems to me you should save one of the best stories that also happens at the end of the "Holiday Season" for the end of the book.

A lovely collection of Christmas inspired stories ranging from contemporary to fantasy.

(Audiobook - Which will start being a new mark on these reviews as my 40-minute drive each way to work has become a new time for podcasts and books now.)

This was about as amazing as I was expecting it to be. Most of the stories, like all good short stories, left me longing for more at their ends and fully sure those worlds went on somewhere beyond the last word in each other. I was a little distracted by the narrator changing every story, but otherwise a mass advise for anyone who wants some cheery, christmas ya short story romance reads all in completely different settings.

I bought this book a couple Christmas seasons ago. I had trouble getting into it.I decided this would be the year I finished it. I only enjoyed chapters 6 and 11. The rest were boring. Find yourself a more joyful book for your Christmas season reading.

This book was overflowing with wonderful, seasonal stories. I don't want to call them Christmas stories because that would truly downplay the book. It's refreshing. Unique. The stories take place in the winter but each author brings their own magic to the canvas. Pick it up and really read it. In a short time, you can feel the depth of each story.

Such a good holiday read! Found some new favorite authors.

A great collection of stories! Although these are labeled as "holiday stories," most of them just happened during the holidays and didn't really focus on them. I wasn't familiar with all the authors so it was a fun way to experience authors I might not typically read. Favorites included stories by Stephanie Perkins, Gayle Forman, Kiersten White (my favorite of them - made me cry!), Ally Carter, and Laini Taylor.

This holiday short story anthology edited by Stephanie Perkins features stories by some of the hottest names in YA right now: Holly Black, Gayle Foreman, Laini Taylor, Rainbow Rowell, and more. Though, naturally, some stories are better than others, the overall quality is high.My personal favorites were "It's a Yuletide Miracle, Charlie Brown" by Stephanie Perkins, "Welcome to Christmas, CA" by Kiersten White, "The Girl Who Woke the Dreamer" by Laini Taylor, and of course "Midnights" by Rainbow Rowell. "Polaris is Where You'll Find Me" by Jenny Han struck me as the weakest of the lot, and I didn't particularly care for "Krampuslauf" by Holly Black, though that's more a matter of taste than of quality (Holly Black is a hit-or-miss author for me). Also, because I used to live in Oklahoma, I spent more time while reading "Star of Bethlehem" trying to pinpoint the geography than I did actually enjoying the story. I'm not convinced that Ally Carter has ever been to Oklahoma. My main issue with the book as a whole was that it led off with the story that should have been saved for the grand finale. That's obviously a minor issue, because on the whole I found this collection an enjoyable read, and I would recommend it to anyone looking for a light, seasonal story or twelve.

Fun short stories written by authors I adore. Some of the stories like Stephanie Perkins', Rainbow Rowell's, Ally Carter's, and Laini Taylor's would be wonderful to expand into full novels. Highly enjoyable!

I LOVED this short story collection! I just want to wrap up this book and give it to all my friends for Christmas. It's freaking adorable! The collection of authors who have stories in here is impressive, they're all kings and queens of the YA market. There is Holly Black, Rainbow Rowell, David Levithan, Gayle Forman, Laini Taylor and several more. Each short story is holiday themed romance, but beyond that, they vary wildly! There is Hannakuh, New Years, Krampus Day; Kelly Link throws some fantasy in her London Christmas story, David Levithan throws ho ho homosexuals in (adorable and sad story, as always), Holly Black gets wild in "Krampuslauf," and there is much much more. I read this book in a span of one day, and I was not disappointed in a single story! I think my two favorites were by Holly Black and Stephanie Perkins. This is a must read for teens and adults this holiday season. You seriously won't be disappointed. Best holiday book I've read in a long time, perhaps... ever?!

A collection of twelve short stories set in and around the holidays by twelve different authors in YA fiction.I picked this one up because of Stephanie Perkins and stuck around because the majority of these stories were a delightful hit of holiday magic. While inevitably my favourite stories in the collection were by my favourite authors (Stephanie Perkins and Rainbow Rowell), there were several stories by authors I had not previously encountered that I also adored. Only two of the stories were duds for me - not that they were poorly written but that they didn't fit with what I wanted out of the collection. The collection is a nice mix of Christmas, Hannukah, and New Year's tales and while the majority of romances are hetero, David Levithan delivers a very lovely story about two teen boys. There were also a couple stories in the collection that I enjoyed so much I desperately wished for more; a whole book could be pulled from some of the narratives. Overall, an excellent book to pick up during the holidays and one that's very easy to dip in and out of over the course of the season.

I did not read this entire book but rather just a few of the authors I know or who's stories intrigued me. Here's what I thought of each individual story:Rainbow Rowell - 4 - So cute! This was one of the shorter stories but I enjoyed both of the characters and thought their story was a cute, simple one. Kelly Link - 2.5 - Fantasy isn't my genre to begin with but i felt like I never connected to any of the characters and I felt a little uncomfortable and confused with the story line most of the time. Matt De La Pena - 3 - Very cheesy, dull story line. I kept waiting for the big climax and nothing ever happened. Jenny Han - 4 - I really enjoyed this story but it felt like very unoriginal to me. Most of the story had parallels to the movie Elf but I still liked reading about Natty and her elf friends. Stephanie Perkins - 5 - Wow I loved this story so much! Marigold and North were lovely and I found myself really connecting to and caring about them in just 30 pages. A story not only about love but also about family. David Levithan - 4 - The relationship between these two is wonderful, I felt so much hot reading about Riley and Santa and remembering how wonderful Christmas is when it's shared with the one you love

I thoroughly enjoyed this collection of holiday short stories. From Rainbow Rowell to Ally Carter to Kiersten White, I have several favorites among these authors, but a few I haven't read anything by--yet. With most anthologies, I sometimes lose interest in some stories, as they just aren't my cup of tea. Across the board, all of these, even in genres I don't normally gravitate toward, I found I really enjoyed all of these short works. They're mostly contemporary, realistic style pieces, with a few edgier bits thrown in. A couple may register a little more paranormal for some, actually seemed to be based in various fairytale/folklore roots, which I found especially interesting. This was a well put together, well edited selection of holiday tales that won't go out of style anytime soon.

Holiday stories about loss, hope, and love, some quirky, some heartfelt.5 Stars to "It's a Yuletide Miracle, Charlie Brown" and "Welcome to Christmas, CA."4 Stars to "Beer Buckets and Baby Jesus" and "Angels in the Snow."3-3.5 Stars to the rest.An enjoyable read, especially if you are familiar with the contributors. And just in time for the holidays.Net Galley Feedback

It's been a long time since I've read a holiday romance, but I'm a big fan of the old Christmas stories. I hadn't realized how much My True Love Gave To Me was a collection of love stories of sorts, but this made it possible for me to approach the stories with a blank slate.I'd read some YA in the past and have read works by some of the featured authors (Holly Black, Ally Carter, Matt De La Pena, Gayle Forman, Jenny Han, David Leviathan, Laini Taylor and Rainbow Rowell) and quite a few were new to me (Kelly Link, Myra McEntire, Stephanie Perkins, Kiersten White). I loved that this collection introduced me to new authors and took me to very different ideas of holiday stories.The collection gives us a wide range of holiday stories but the characters are all the age of college students or new graduates. While there's a mix of backgrounds, races, sexual preferences, the people that we read about all share a certain mix of disappointment and wonder. The stories themselves left me remembering the excitement and joy of finding someone that I wanted to stay up all night with, wanted to explore the town with, someone who made things new.I'm keeping these stories for myself but I might get this book for a college aged niece. It's a good book to share with friends, if your friends enjoy YA and/or love stories.

I loved the first story by Rainbow Rowell and another one by Kiersten White. Others were okay and a couple entered the territory of "Mystical Realism" which doesn't usually work for me. I want to feel excited for these couples - these are the sort of stories that are supposed to make me smile as I read them. This anthology just fell flat.

Charming as all get out

Veronica's copy

One of my favorite activites, that I could seriously spend hours contemplating is browsing books. Admiring them, looking for them, ordering some, wishing for another pile, and feeling unnaturally happy when I find an author I love writing a sequel to a favorite series or releasing a new book.

So imagine my happiness, when I stumbled upon this cute bookworm blog, showing her edition of this book, with Stephanie Perkins name on the cover. I ordered it on the spot. I wanted the same fuschia and mint cover.

My drug dealer (aka book dealer) got it for me and I felt goosebumps on my flesh as I held it. It's a beautiful book, perfect for the holiday season and freezing winter, filled with names of some of my favorite authors. So now, I'm finally reading it and I hope I finish it before the year is out.

1- Midnights by Rainbow Rowell
This one is very cute, about two friends who always meet in the same new year's party every year, until finally they admit to each other they're in love.

2- The Lady and the Fox by Kelly Link
This one is super strange, kept me reading on quickly, the peculiar story and the strange way it's written. A kind of magical realism novel close to 'Snow Queen' movie mixed with something French. At least that's how I felt.

3- Angels in the Snow by Matt de la Pena

Stories I enjoyed: Angels in the Snow by Matt De La Pena; Your Temporary Santa by David Levithan; Krampuslauf by Holly Black; and Welcome to Christmas, CA, by Kiersten White.

You've heard me say it before - I love reading Christmas fiction in the days leading up to the 25th. Life is incredibly busy right now, so the 12 holiday stories in My True Love Gave to Me were just perfect. I could get my fix in short bursts.Zoom in on the cover - twelve best-selling YA authors contributed to this collection, edited by Stephanie Perkins. You love their novels, so you just know you're going to love these stories. Perkins has drawn from diverse writers so the tales range from contemporary to fantasy and magical realism.I must admit - I had two favourites - and they're two of my fave YA writers as well - Rainbow Rowell and Gayle Forman. Rowell's story has two friends slowly inching towards more over the course of four New Year's Eves. Clever back and forth bantering and an engaging pair of characters had me crossing my fingers as each New Year drew closer to twelve. Gayle's story has a pair of students who aren't quite fitting in at their college meeting at a holiday event and realizing that they may have found more than a new friend.Matt De La Pena was a new to me author and I'll be hunting down more of his work. His story of a shy cat-sitting guy alone over the holidays - until he meets the girl who lives above - was charming in its simplicity.This collection was actually a great way to sample some new authors for me as well. Love romance? Love the holidays? Then My True Love Gave to Me is a gift you'll want to buy yourself or any YA fan. I'll be re-reading this one again next year.

I always love to read anthologies because it allows me to discover new authors to keep my eye on and rediscover old favorites.I loved some of the stories included in this book and I wasn't a fan of some stories, which is the whole point of books like this. I was pleased with this book; it is a good holiday read on a snowy day with a large mug of tea.

After I read and loved Rainbow Rowell’s short story “Midnights” (in Almost Midnight), I borrowed the anthology in which first appeared. I had some reservations - I’m not a fan of the whole cheesy, commercial idea of Christmas and winter - but I enjoyed these stories more than I was expecting to. They present different experiences of, and attitudes towards, the holiday season.I wasn’t sure about “The Lady and the Fox” by Kelly Link for the first few pages but it ended up being one of my favourites. Miranda spends a series of Christmases with the Honeywells, a theatrical and aristocratic family, and befriends the strange and solitary Honeywell she finds in the garden.My other favourites were Stephanie Perkins’ “It’s a Yuletide Miracle, Charlie Brown”, about Marigold, who goes to a Christmas tree lot to ask a favour of a boy who works there, and Gayle Forman’s “What the Hell Have You Done, Sophie Roth?”, about a college freshman who is wondering if she’s ever going to fit in here.Sophie wondered when was she going to learn that lots of things seem like a good idea but a small amount of analysis might uncover that such seemingly good ideas are, in fact, intrinsically faulty. Take communism. Seemed like a good idea: Everyone shares, no one goes hungry. But maybe give it a good think and you’d come away understanding for it to work you’d need an inhuman capacity for cooperation, or a much more human capacity for totalitarianism.I really liked “Beer Buckets and Baby Jesus” by Myra McEntire and “Star of Bethlehem” by Ally Carter, and I liked Lainie Taylor’s “The Girl Who Woke the Dreamer” for its prose, if not its resolution.

Overall Summary and Review: My True Love Gave To Me is a collection of twelve holiday stories - mostly Christmas, but a few New Year's Eve, and one Hanukkah story as well. This was not a particularly challenging book - sometimes, I just want a little fun, light, fluffy holiday reading where everyone winds up happy and in love and I don't have to think too hard for my warm fuzzies. Although there certainly was some variety, a lot of the stories fell into the same general pattern - a protagonist who is carrying around some kind of baggage or past trauma (I was surprised how many dead, divorced, troubled, or otherwise absent parents there were in this collection) meets someone that they wouldn't usually fall for, but then their defenses are broken down and they wind up falling for them anyways. Within the first page or two of each story, it was pretty clear who was going to end up with whom. They also, for the most part, had fairly similar tones and writing styles - David Levithan's and Laini Taylor's stories were the exception, but most of the others were fun and light with a sense of humor that lands somewhere between bubbly and snarky. (David Levithan's story was also the exception in that it was pretty much the only one that wasn't a meet-cute, but rather a story featuring an already established (if somewhat newly established) couple). Most of them were contemporary as well - there's a few that have some fantasy elements (Kelly Link's story, Jenny Han's story, Holly Black's story, and Laini Taylor's story), but of these, only Laini Taylor's is set somewhere that isn't recognizably our world. 4.5 out of 5 stars.Individual Stories: "Midnights" by Rainbow Rowell was a story about a girl who has watched her best friend kiss other girls during their New Year's Eve parties in years past, and is getting fed up with it. I liked this story a lot - Rowell's good at writing teen romance, so no surprise there - and part of me understands that you want to have a big name (and a good story) to lead off a collection like this. But it still felt really strange to start off a collection with a New Years' story and then go "back" to a bunch of Christmas stories.In "The Lady and the Fox" by Kelly Link, a girl is raised in the household of the large and flamboyant Honeywell family of actors, but when she sees a handsome young man in costume standing out in the snow during a Christmas party, she starts to get curious about his story. I enjoyed it, and thought it set the "winter in the snowy woods" feeling very well, but something about the end, and the explanation of what was going on, didn't entirely gel for me."Angels in the Snow" by Matt de la Peña involves a young man who can't afford much in the way of food, let alone enough to go home for Christmas, and so he winds up snowbound in the fancy apartment he's house-sitting for his friend, with the young woman upstairs the only other person in the building. A good story, with some very sweet moments (the muffin scene!), and I liked that it ended on a hopeful note, but not as though romance fixes everything.In "Polaris is Where You'll Find Me" by Jenny Han, the only human at the North Pole (Santa's adopted child) has been pining away for one of the elves for as long as she can remember, but he doesn't see her in the same way. Probably my least favorite story in the collection; the "romance" angle of the story didn't really work for me or feel all that romantic, and although I liked the idea of the only human at the North Pole, the worldbuilding wasn't entirely convincing."It's a Yuletide Miracle, Charlie Brown" by Stephanie Perkins was my favorite story of the collection. (No real surprise there; her novel-length romances are also great.) Marigold has been living with her mom in pretty dire circumstances since her dad left, but when she approaches the young man working at the nearby Christmas tree lot, she winds up with something more than just a holiday decoration. Very sweet, and the dialogue was great: snappy and flirty and funny and believable."Your Temporary Santa" by David Levithan involved a young man whose boyfriend asks him to "break into" their house to play Santa for his younger sister. While I liked this story, and the way it slowly let you in to what was really going on, it was very different from the other stories in the collection - the protagonist and the love interest aren't interacting for most of the story, but instead he's having to deal with his boyfriend's family drama that he's been suddenly put into the middle of. Realistic, and well done, but the shift in tone was a little jarring.In "Krampuslauf" by Holly Black, when Hanna discovers that one of her friends' rich boyfriend is cheating on her, they decide to throw a New Year's Eve party at her grandmother's trailer and invite his new girlfriend. They also invite a mysterious but attractive stranger, who turns out to be somewhat more than he seemed. That's a terrible summary, but if you've read any of Holly Black's other books, the idea of magical creatures from Faerie crashing a disastrous NYE party fits right into her milieu. I liked this story a lot, not necessarily because of the romance angle (although that was fun too), but because I appreciated Hanna's worldview about magic, and will, and creation, and belief. "What The Hell Have You Done, Sophie Roth?" by Gayle Forman is the lone Hanukkah story in the collection (although the main character of "Your Temporary Santa" was Jewish). It involves a girl from New York City who has gone to college in a tiny Midwestern town and is feeling very out of place, until she meets a guy who might just understand more than she thinks. While the romance in story was sweet, I am originally from the Midwest, and I found Sophie's initial attitude of "everyone in the Midwest is basically a starry-eyed uncultured Ned Flanders clone who doesn't understand how sarcasm works" to be clichéd and kind of off-putting."Beer Buckets and Baby Jesus" by Myra McEntire involves a teenage troublemaker in a small town who has been sentenced to help with the local church's Living Nativity play - in which the pastor's daughter is playing Mary - and he may wind up wrecking it, or save it from itself. This story didn't quite do it for me - I think there was a little bit too much going on, and I couldn't get all the relationships straight, and it didn't quite feel like the emotions had enough time to pan out.In "Welcome to Christmas, CA" by Kiersten White, Maria works in the Christmas Café in the tiny town of Christmas, CA... and hates it. She can't wait to leave Christmas forever... until the restaurant gets a new cook who has a knack for making exactly the food that people need, even if they don't know it. I've used the word "sweet" a lot in this review, and this one was too, but I think what touched me most was the evolution of the relationship not between Maria and Ben, but between Maria and her mom and her mom's boyfriend."Star of Bethlehem" by Ally Carter involves a young woman anxious for escape who gives an Icelandic exchange student her airline ticket, and takes her ticket in return... and winds up in the middle of nowhere, Oklahoma, with young man who knows she's not who she says she is, and his whole family who think she's someone she's not. Another very sweet story, and the only story here that had a twist that actually surprised me. Very well built and well written, and I appreciated the main character having to develop a relationship with the family, not just with the guy.In "The Girl Who Woke the Dreamer" by Laini Taylor, when a young girl of marriageable age starts receiving attentions from the Reverend, who has already buried three young wives, she prays for salvation - and wakes the mythical power that controls the island on which she lives. This one is very very different from the other stories in this collection, but I really enjoyed it. Laini Taylor's writing is so beautiful, and her worldbuilding so quirky and unique, that I got really immersed in this story very quickly. I did find it a little odd trying to figure out if this was meant to be our world, and if so, where and how, and if not, why are they celebrating Christmas? But the ending was beautiful and powerful and actually felt a lot like the magic and the wonder of Christmas, despite it having almost no "traditional" Christmas elements. Recommendation: Definitely recommended for some light holiday reading, particularly if you like any of the authors involved, YA romances, or books like Let It Snow.

I always love picking up a new Christmas themed book every Christmas, I was pretty excited about this one. It was full of cute, Christmas stories, perfect for the Holiday Season. I probably would of gotten through it faster if I wasn't so busy with all the festivities and preparation.A couple stories really stuck out and I wished they were full books, Rainbow Rainell and Stephanie Perkins' stories had me wanting more. I'm a HUGE Stephanie Perkins fan so I really wasn't surprise that her short story was so good. The cover is adorable and very festive, I enjoyed reading this and getting into the Christmas spirit!”