I loved everything about this book and I love a good Cozy Fantasy. I highly recommend this book to everyone and will be getting myself a physical copy the second its published

Coffeeshop in an Alternate Universe was such a breath of fresh air when it came to the cozy fantasy world! This was such a unique and intriguing world, with a love story for the ages. The cozy feelings magically made everything seem to come to life! Will be rereading this book for sure!

This book was such a fun read! This book centered on two teens who are from different worlds. They meet when one of them accidentally walks through a portal and now have to figure out how to get back to each other and save their worlds.

I really enjoyed the story and the relationships in this book. I think the writing is great. I would not call this cozy fantasy though because the stakes are just far too high and the action is too intense for that.

I will absolutely be picking up a copy of this once it releases.

Yes, this book is fun. Yes, I like the alternate universe. Brenda and Kat are cute and honestly watching Brenda discover magic was great. This is for the D&D lovers, the Doctor Who fans who love subtle references. This has a fun fantasy world that is dealing with mana surges that can create dimensional doors that links to the real world. It was cool seeing the differences between the two worlds.
I think this book would entertain the younger side of YA, but I don't know if it would hit the older teens. As always, don't use my review as a decision to not read or read this book. Everyone has different tastes and if you end up liking this book, that's great. It just wasn't for me.

I would not say this is a cozy fantasy. I didn't really get cozy from this story seeing as mana surges and other things were actually raising the stakes. But also things in the magic world didn't make sense. One being Kat's world doesn't have Wi-Fi, but Brenda entered the coffeeshop specifically for the wifi. Something I notice with C.B. Lee is how fast pace her romances are. Kat and Brenda instalove after only one interaction was hard to believe and took me out of the story a few times especially half way. Not only the romance, but I felt like Brenda's personality changed from sounding like a mature and responsible teen, but really seemed immature. She also went from organized and have to do things in such a way to "just vibing". It really kind of bugged me. ALSO, maybe it's just me but they accepted the fact that they live in an alternate universe so easily. There was no freak out and even Brenda telling her friends was way too easy to just accept. It made it a little hard to stay into the story.

I loved this so much! Cozy fantasy romance is my jam and this book was a delight from the first moment. I loved how different Brenda (determined, going a mile a minute) and Kay (apathetic, prankster) SEEMED. But once you get to know them their passion and love for their friends and family shone so brightly. I loved their meet-cute, their dynamic and how trusting they were of each other. I also loved their friends and family and how seamlessly they all supported the two MCs in both their romance and their epic quest. The worldbuilding was fabulous; a sweet spot of unique and intriguing without being confusing.  I love the idea that there is an alternate universe out there that is so similar, but ya know with magic! This was a cozy fun adventure and even though the stakes were high, you knew that it would all be okay and you could just enjoy the ride!

“Apparently the big secret to life is that the universe hears everything you want: everything you put into it, all your hopes and dreams, every energy into every thought. So the more positively you think—the more energy you put into believing that your dreams are possible, the more motivation you have to go after them—the more the universe will respond in kind and make you more in tune to see those opportunities.”

Brenda is an overachieving high school senior with plans to save the world with science, but when her internet gives out right before a crucial scholarship deadline, her entire future is on the line. In search of WiFi, she finds herself in Kat’s family’s coffee shop. They instantly connect, and Brenda is in awe of Kat’s confidence while Kat is mesmerized by Brenda’s passion and mind. However, Brenda accidentally went through a portal to another universe when she stepped into the coffee shop, one filled with magic, mythical creatures, and Kat, the Chosen One. As it turns out, that portal was just one of many beginning to appear. When their universes start to collide, Brenda is determined to save the world, but Kat has spent her whole life trying to outrun her destiny. Can the two girls truly change the world for the better?

Coffee Shop in an Alternate Universe was a heartfelt coming-of-age novel about two girls finding love and learning the meaning of life in a world filled with both magic and strife. Brenda and Kat perfectly balanced each other’s personalities. Kat’s confidence and go-with-the-flow attitude helped Brenda learn to relax and enjoy her time outside of school and college prep. In return, Brenda taught Kat to face her fears and embrace her destiny. The best relationships, both in books and in life, are when the two grow and evolve as a result of their connection. I also loved the role that their cultures played in the novel. Brenda is Vietnamese, and Kat is Chinese, and the author showed us this through their food, language, and families rather than just mentioning their ethnicities in passing. Their cultures also played a role in the main conflict and the key to the resolution, which I thought was a great touch. The magic system was intriguing and mimicked technology in many ways, though there were times when elements of it felt a bit unclear. I also felt that the conflict escalated very quickly. One second, there were just a few portals that Kat and Brenda were wandering through, and the next thing I knew, the worlds were colliding. Despite this, I still thoroughly enjoyed the book and the ending in particular. Lee crafted an unexpectedly simple, emotional solution to a larger-than-life problem that focused on love and good intentions. I would recommend this book to anyone searching for a YA coming-of-age romance with a touch of magic and a lot of heart.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC!

Aaaah, words can hardly describe how delightful this was! As a 2nd-gen Chinese-Viet from SoCal, reading this book felt like coming home. I adore the thought put into Kat and Brenda's respective backgrounds of being Chinese and Vietnamese and all the little references I could spot about the Asian American community in Los Angeles. The recommended reading list at the end was pretty cool too and made it clear how much research the author did despite it not even being the main focus of the story. In regards to the main story though, Kat and Brenda's love story was so incredibly cute and well-developed. I really liked how natural their attraction to each other felt and how it was based on their personalities rather than physical attraction, which made a lot of sense with the mention that Brenda might be demisexual (solidarity!). The main conflict was very nicely woven between their dates together, and although the antagonist was pretty predictable, I don't think that's a bad thing for a story as cozy as this. I also really appreciate the numerous side characters who helped support the main characters because it really emphasized the main theme at the climax of love for the community and love for the world. All in all, a lovely, wholesomely sweet sapphic read, and I will definitely be grabbing myself a copy once it releases!

I had fun with this! The first half was really fun and I liked the characters, Kat and Brenda. The second half slowed down a lot for me and I think I could have enjoyed it more if I was a D&D fan. Rating is a 3.5 but I'm rounding up to a 4 star.

Thank you to Macmillan for sending me a free digital copy in exchange for my review!

This was a fun read, with a more in-depth storyline than I had anticipated. It took me a while to get into it, but I enjoyed it once I got going.

There were a few things that felt kind of scattered or pointless — werewolves mentioned but not for any plot purposes, characters that didn’t really have a purpose, lots of typos or confusing sentences (at least in the ARC version), some repetitive descriptions, and some details that didn’t quite line up.

Overall, this is a fun fantasy read and I enjoyed the two main characters and their stories, and enjoyed the world building done in the book!

I will say- I didn't realize this was a young adult novel, so it took me a minute to adjust my expectations, but once I did, I really enjoyed this book. It does an excellent job of bringing us into two different worlds with two entirely different characters and identities. This was ultimately a really sweet sapphic story with an adorable giant cat!

From the premise alone I was always going to love Coffeeshop in an Alternate Universe. It's not only about thin spaces between universes and a love of DND, but it's also about friendship and powerful love. It's about family, community, and what's right and wrong. Lee packs a whole lot into this YA contemporary fantasy. This dual POV combination allows us to see the differences and similarities in the worlds of Brenda and Kat. Sure there may be literal dragons, but there's also Chosen Ones, friendships, and community. Coffeeshop in an Alternate Universe straddles this line between contemporary romance and also adventure story about the fate of their universes.

Look, at this point I'm used to marketing lying to me about a book being "cozy fantasy." I can work with that, although I wish they'd stop. However, blaming a book for it's bad marketing doesn't make sense (the book came first, and in the case of tradpub, the author isn't usually calling the shots on their marketing). But please know that when the blurb is like, "Cozy Coffeeshop AU!" that it's an inaccurate description of the plot.

ANYWAY. I was really on-board for the first half of this book, but at about 50%, the pacing gets real weird. There's the cute romance, which I'm here for. But there's also this other larger plot which starts to become more relevant, and it doesn't make the most sense. It's weirdly complicated, although it didn't need to be, because the actual reveal is pretty straightforward .However, the characters don't make much of an effort to solve it, even though it's presented as a life or death situation. There are also a bunch of places where off-page events are summarized, but then a whole lot of nothing happens in the developed scenes.

I could have still left this with a four-star experience, but then the author did a thing I cannot stand: we learn who the villain is, but the character who learns this info doesn't fully understand the implications. She then speaks to the other MC and tells her everything, EXCEPT THE NAME OF THE PERSON INVOLVED. And the other MC... doesn't ask? For what possible reason?

As a result, I spent the last quarter of the book feeling irritable. A bunch of dramatic monologues, and a moment that should have been really touching, were mashed in at the end of the story in a way that was borderline incoherent. I can't go into detail about how infuriating the climactic scene was, but I really wish there had been some structural changes to this book, because there is little that annoys me more as a reader than when the characters do silly and incomprehensible things for the sake of the plot. And it doesn't advance the plot! This just slows it way down for no discernable reason! *screams into a pillow*

The thing is, as much as the plot choices annoyed me, the world is so cool. I really enjoyed the concept, and there were some scenes that were really beautiful and lyrical, along with plenty of nods to other stories that inspired some of these moments. There are fun misunderstandings, and interesting scenarios where the characters engage with magic in different ways. It's not fully explored, but there's a suggestion that the stories of 'our world' (arguably not ours, for plot reasons, but the ones that most resembles ours) are inherently magical, and that engaging with stories increases one's ability to harness magic. That's beautiful. Not to mention all the little details that Lee includes about Kat and Brenda and their families. There's a lot to enjoy here, and I was all in for the first half of the book.

Lee mentions in the notes that this was originally going to be cozy fantasy, but then it morphed into something else. If this was going to stay cozy, I wish the plot had been ironed out. If it was going to go more epic, I'd have appreciated some editing for punchier pacing. As it was, there were times when the MCs sort of went, "Yeah, I know that our worlds are in trouble, but what if we did something cutesy and unrelated for three chapters rather than solving my mother's murder?" I think I found this book so frustrating because there were parts I thoroughly enjoyed, and then parts where I felt like I was slogging along in the hopes that something would eventually happen.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC copy. My long and meandering thoughts are my own, and are being left voluntarily.

This ya sapphic contemporary fantasy is perfect for cozy fantasy and D&D fans (full disclosure: I don't play D&D, but it was mentioned a lot and I'm sure there are Easter Eggs in the book that a fan would understand)!

From the jump, I was into this story. Brenda is a perfectionist and needs scholarships to go to college. She has an application due, but her internet at home goes out. She stumbles into a coffee shop with Wifi where Kat is working. The two hit it off and decide to meet up for a date over the weekend, but neither realizes that there are alternate universes, and Kat's coffee shop isn't from Brenda's world.

This story was funny and sweet and suspenseful. I enjoyed watching the characters figure out there are alternate universes, why, and how that impacts their worlds. There's magic seeping from one world into the other. Portals that accidentally bring magical creatures to LA. Earthquakes caused by magic. And these teens are going to figure it out. I believed that they could!

This is a truly special story. Pick it up for a magical time!

Thank you to the publisher for providing me with an e-arc in exchange for my honest review.

This book was SO unique!!! The world building was really cool, and I loved the blending of cultures within and across both worlds. I’m not the biggest fan of insta love but Brenda and Kat were just too sweet that I couldn’t help rooting for them! If you’re looking for the perfect, cozy YA sapphic fantasy (with the cutest dragon🥰) I recommend picking this one up!!

Unfortunately this was a DNF for me, but mostly because I'm not in the mood for cozy YA fantasy right now. I also balk slightly at calling this cozy since the stakes are higher (city destroying magic surges don't quite make for cozy vibes), but anyone looking for a story involving a reluctant chosen one and a cute sapphic romance will have a good time.

This was a really cute book. The fantasy elements were really well done and I love how it just added to the universe. Brenda and Kat are adorable and I love how they are kind of awkward at first but settle in to it pretty fast.

I received an arc through netgalley.

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Coffeeshop in an Alternate Universe by C.B. LeeCoffeeshop in an Alternate Universe
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3.5 ⭐️ — a cozy, funny, and sweet romcom across dimensions!

I enjoyed the premise of this story quite a bit, it’s very creative and fun. There has been a trend of multiverse storytelling (mostly in film) lately but this use of the multiverse feels very individual. If you love Dungeons and Dragons or Doctor Who, you’ll find your place right in this story.

i was charmed by the fantasy world in the book and how the author decided to approach the wordle differences between the dimensions. The magic was unique, and though at times it took me awhile to follow the rules and worldbuilding for the magic of Kat’s world, I think the author knew when to give explanations without info dumping. There was one time that when recounting an event, we literally go through Brenda’s notes after the event just happened but honestly it helped since all the multidimensional drama can teeter on confusing.

There are a lot of side characters in this book so at the beginning it was difficult keeping track of Brenda and Kat’s friends or circles since they do have speaking parts or are notable in some capacity. I wasn’t sure about Brenda at first as her narration wasn’t exactly my cup of tea (or coffee I guess) but later in the story as she grew I liked her a bit more. YA voice is difficult to nail but for what Brenda’s character was, sometimes she was almost too childish. I think the setting over the characters themselves were more compelling for me.

The pacing also was a bit here and there for me. At the beginning it took too long for me to get into because of the melding of the multiverse timeline but then at times I also wanted to explore just some of the random bits of the world more. There is a bit of info dumping at times, even if I find the worlds very creative. But that may just be me!

I did think it ended a bit fast and with so many things you could’ve explored, it left me wanting more but also feeling like the more interesting parts of the worldbuilding could’ve been focused on further. There are some things where I’m like “how does this work…” in terms of worldbuilding since like both worlds have their own version of Target if like there are very specific circumstances in which Target was invented. Like sure any universe has a coffee shop but how did the magic dragon place invent Target (and I was kind of annoyed at how many times Target was mentioned like yes I get it we are in Target).

Thank you Netgalley for this copy.

Brenda is a girl from our world, trying to get into college, and worried about climate change. Kat lives in an alternate version of our world, full of magic. When they stumble into each other thanks to some portals, they find themselves at the center of saving both their worlds and magic in Kat's world becomes more and more unstable, creating consequences for Brenda's world. Oh, and while they're at it, they fall in love.

Both girls are such awesome leads, I loved following their parallel but also unique struggles. I also enjoyed their individual relationships with the families, and their friends. Watching Kat cope with the looming chosen one life, or death, and how it impacted her relationships, made an interesting story to follow.

The world was also fantastic. Brenda's is, of course, very recognizable, but Kat's was incredibly interesting. How the magic replaces technology, the ways their world grew and changed to be so similar and yet so different from our own, the one Brenda lives in.

While not nearly as cozy as I expected (saving the world will never feel low stakes), I did still enjoy this. The magic system was a little difficult to follow at first, but I think I got it sorted out, and the sweet romance between Brenda and Kat was a good counter to the less cozy aspects of the book. I always love interesting takes on Chosen One narratives, so Kat's arc was interesting to me, and Brenda's overachieving focus spoke to my teenage self.

I will say, I did have some things that I didn't love as much - the way too easy acceptance of magic was a running theme and I found the villain to be a little too predictable - but all in all a solid book.

3.5/5

Thank you to Macmillan Children's Publishing Group/Feiwel & Friends and Netgalley for the eARC!

Brenda has an exhaustive plan to achieve academic perfection and ultimately save the world through science. Kat is a rebellious Chosen One, and she's absolutely sick of everyone leaning on her to complete the ritual that already killed her mom. The teens' contrasting personalities mesh beautifully, but their budding relationship is hampered by the fact that they live in parallel worlds: Brenda's is mundane but Kat's is full of increasingly unstable magic. The plot alternates between their adorable dates every time they find a portal and the quest to save Kat's world. It's sweet, and Fancy is a very good kitty.