Love Bytes

@Cafe #1

by Elizabeth Craft

The thick-or-thin friendship of the @ Cafe staff faces its first challenge when Dylan falls in love with Natalie, putting in question the staff rule to avoid personal relationships with each other

Genres: Young Adult, Chick Lit, Romance, Childrens

192 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 1997

About the author

Elizabeth Craft and Sarah Fain wrote their first piece together when they were fifteen - a feature on Kansas City delis for their high school newspaper.

They now live in Los Angeles, where Sarah and Liz are currently Writer-Producers on the Emmy-award winning show "The Shield" and James Patterson's upcoming "Women's Murder Detective Club" TV series debuting this fall on ABC.

Reviews

[Lauren Guzman · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was my very favorite childhood series. It's probably the main reason I ended up as a barista for my entire college life and a bit beyond. I am going to re-read the series because I want to see how much it truly affected my life in hindsight. :)

[Siena · Rating 3 out of 5]

Super fun, fluffy, CW -esque goodness! Unfortunately suffers from the fact that 2 of the 6 main characters (Dylan and Natalie, who are like the MAIN mains) are so dull I wanted to cry lmao! Hoping the next books focus more on the fun ones!

[Erica Leigh · Rating 2 out of 5]

A charming, frothy, and aggressively y2k look into a young, hip coffee shop and the complicated friendships and budding romances within.

The workplace: the hippest internet cafe in San Francisco.

The intertwining friendships and light love triangles are a bit hard to follow because there are so many characters involved, but I did appreciate the handy profiles in the beginning. The characters aren’t exactly the most exciting or fleshed out, but it’s an easy read.

My favorite parts in the book were the cafe’s Spill the Beans online zine entries, ~written by the various employees. I’d read a whole book of just the zine itself!!

Really enjoyed all the pop culture references, fashion descriptions, and early internet references, sprinkled throughout. VERY of the time.

A few cliches that I honestly enjoyed—
- a small makeover scene with a very She’s All That level reveal
- Fake dating turned (potential) romance
- Friendship turned crush

I really wish this had been made into some after school ensemble comedy or WB teen drama. I’d drink it right up. But I suppose I can just dream (and read the rest of the series).

[Sely Moreno · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m giving this book a five star rating purely based off of nostalgia. This book meant so much to me 10 years ago and re-reading it this time around has been an amazing experience. I love the friendships, I loved how juvenile YA was at this time, I love the café setting and coffee references. I’m happy to have this book in my library for a quick read pick me up.

[Kristin · Rating 2 out of 5]

Just ok. The characters aren’t that interesting and not much happens despite being 200+ pages. There are better series from the time period like Making Out and SVH Senior Year.

[Kayleigh P · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this entire series in middle school. It’s about a friend group that works at a coffee shop- you don’t get more 90s than that. They experience the typical social and romantic upheaval. This probably isn’t as good as SVH but I loved it because it was set in San Francisco, so it felt like home. Also, there was a character named Blue who I worshiped as the epitome of edgy punk rock princess.

[Bree · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another teenage read. I was majorly disappointed when the books were stopped. These are similar to Katherine Applegate's making out series.

[Christy wu · Rating 3 out of 5]

CUUUUUUTE!!!
This is like You've Got Mail, Friends, and all the rest of the adorable nineties in a teen romance that really took me back. AWWWW.