no ordinary love

by Roxane Gay, R.O. Kwon, Oisín McKenna

No Ordinary Love, an anthology of love stories that encourages daters to challenge the notion of “perfect fairytale beginnings” and celebrate the beautiful imperfections of real relationships. Six contemporary literary figures — Roxane Gay, R. O. Kwon, John Paul Brammer, Brontez Purnell, Isle McElroy, and Oisín Mckenna — have paired with six real-life couples who met on Hinge to interpret their experiences and explore modern romance in an 80-page zine made in collaboration with Dazed Studio.

ebook

Published January 1, 2024

About the author

Roxane Gay’s writing appears in Best American Mystery Stories 2014, Best American Short Stories 2012, Best Sex Writing 2012, A Public Space, McSweeney’s, Tin House, Oxford American, American Short Fiction, Virginia Quarterly Review, and many others. She is a contributing opinion writer for the New York Times. She is the author of the books Ayiti, An Untamed State, the New York Times bestselling Bad Feminist, the nationally bestselling Difficult Women and the New York Times bestselling Hunger. She is also the author of World of Wakanda for Marvel. She has several books forthcoming and is also at work on television and film projects. Her newsletter, The Audacity, where she also hosts The Audacious Book Club, can be found at audacity.substack.com.

Reviews

[Ava Bergman · Rating 1 out of 5]

Could’ve had more character development, misspellings, and thought that there could’ve been more plot.

[Lisa H · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don’t know how to feel about this book tbh. The stories are cute but I didn’t feel a connection with the characters (maybe because every story was so short).

[Hibbah]

I’m not gonna rate this because at the end of the day it’s a short story about real people’s meet cutes and I love love. But I did not love this.

[Lau · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 ⭐

I get the intention and the idea behind this collection, but I think the final product ends up being underwhelming. Each of the stories is too short for the reader to get attached to any of them, or to really understand their personalities and struggles during the relationship and empathise with each couple. They feel so hurried, and it would've been great to see more narration, to see each story slowly unfold over time. As love stories they're cute, but they lack depth and development.

[Leena · Rating 1 out of 5]

what so "no ordinary" about this

[wardah ୨ৎ · Rating 1 out of 5]

I can write better love stories than this.

[Camille Pons · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5
This book was okay for me. It was not that bad, the majority of the couples' histories were cute. But I did not care that much for the different characters, maybe because it was really short stories. But it still is a quick cute little read !

[Miriam]

this was an interesting read and something which i stumbled upon by accident to be quite honest, but it was actually heartwarming to read about these modern love stories of people that found love when they were least expecting it ❤️

[Juli · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is basically an ad. Which is why I think it's difficult to rate. It was mostly a quick summary of people who met on hinge getting into relationships. Though it is called "No Ordinary Love" I think it is exactly ordinary people with ordinary stories, which isn't a bad thing. I wanted everyday stories, which is exactly what I got. But them being so short and somewhat rushed/summarised it felt a bit boring as we couldn't form any connection to them.

[Emily Fuentes · Rating 3 out of 5]

it’s hard to review this book. It’s just 6 real life stories of couples who met on a dating app and how their stories progress. it’s short stories. Some were cuter than others lol

[mila_readss · Rating 3 out of 5]

I get the intention and idea behind this anthology, although I think the final product ended up being underwhelming... Every story in this is too short for the reader to get attached to the characters/couples, or to really understand their personalities and struggles during their time being in a relationship and empathise with each couple. They felt too hurried and it would've been great to see more narration, to see each story unfold over time. As love stories they're cute, but to me they lack depth and development.

[Madison · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book was boring to me. It was repetitive on multiple short stories, and the stories were so short and there were so many time skips I couldn’t keep up with what was going on. There wasn’t a lot of detail nor was there a lot of character connection. I’m disappointed, I thought I’d enjoy this one. It was a nice quick read though, so I’ll give it my honest review.

[Riley · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book feels like it is just an ad for Hinge. I read it as it was a book club pick, and I did not enjoy it. The stories were so short that you had really no chance to connect with anyone, and with its abrupt endings when it felt like there was still so much left unsaid, it was just a somewhat disappointing read.

[Linda Belmudez · Rating 1 out of 5]

The title sets you up for something amazing, and you have high expectations... but then you dive in. & it's reading hinge dating app moments— better left in the drafts folder on your Twitter account. It's a huge letdown, far from the depth you hoped for.

[Proctor Penny · Rating 3 out of 5]

A quick read, something a bit different. I didn't find anything particularly poignant but some of the writing was artistic. The accompanying website was pretty cool. I do like the exploration of love in every day life, particularly positive experiences of online dating.

[Ciena · Rating 1 out of 5]

I understand it is composed of short story’s, however this is the embodiment of telling not showing, a couple spelling mistakes which I can look past. Turns out I need to connect with characters to feel giddy

[Carlotta🌙 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Chanti e Najib❤️

[Joanna · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.75 ✮ ⋆ ｡° ⋆

[. · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5
this isn't my kinda thing :/

[Lena Berki · Rating 2 out of 5]

2,5 ⭐️

[ree ♡ · Rating 2 out of 5]

the individual stories are cute ordinary ones, though quite short. there's not much going on and it reads like a friend narrating what they've been up to. as a whole, idk maybe like 2.5 stars.

[okaycoolnai · Rating 1 out of 5]

Bleh

[Caroline]

short & sweet ! a cool collection idea, i do think it would be nice for the stories to be a tad longer in general, but i still thought it was cutie :)

[Scarlet Osorio · Rating 2 out of 5]

It’s a pretty short anthology, but interesting. I don’t know what to say.🧌

[Mike Franco · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a quick read, something a bit different.

[Presh · Rating 1 out of 5]

Short stories that just kept missing the mark for me 🤷🏻‍♀️ it wasn't terrible, but it wasn't all that good either? Idk. Haha. The misspellings were yikes 😬

[•°jordan•°]

so boring omg

[Lilli]

2.5🌟

[Avril · Rating 2 out of 5]

Idk how to feel about this book. It was cute tho.