Daydream

Daydream is the third installment in Grace’s Maple Hills series. Daydream is preceded by Icebreaker and Wildfire. All three of these novels are set at the fictional University of California, Maple Hills in Los Angeles, California. The male protagonists of Icebreaker, Wildfire, and Daydream are all hockey players. Their sporting experiences therefore beget the series’ sports subgenre elements, while the Maple Hills setting inspires the series’ campus subgenre elements.

The first novel in the Maple Hills series, Icebreaker, traces the evolution of Nate Hawkins and Anastasia Allen’s relationship. Nate and Anastasia meet at Maple Hills, where a mysterious ice rink prank forces the hockey player and figure skater into one another’s orbits. Nate and Anastasia’s relationship is antagonistic at its start but gradually develops into a sexual and romantic dynamic. Their characters also resurface in Wildfire and Daydream, as they are a part of the same social circles as these latter novels’ characters.

The second Maple Hills novel Wildfire also traces the romance of two more Maple Hills students and members of the same friend group: Russ Callaghan and Aurora Roberts. Russ and Aurora’s one-night stand at the end of the school year begets their complex relationship as co-camp counselors during the subsequent summer season. Throughout the summer break, Russ and Aurora help one another to confront their personal and familial conflicts, helping each other grow as individuals.

The relationships at the heart of Icebreaker and Wildfire are part of the background of Halle Jacobs’s and Henry Turner’s relationship in Daydream. Halle and Henry are also members of the same friend group as Nate, Anastasia, Russ, and Aurora. Therefore, Halle and Henry’s friends’ romances inform Halle and Henry’s evolving friendship. Nate, Anastasia, Russ, and Aurora not only befriend Halle, but they offer Henry advice as his feelings for Halle develop over time. Like their friends, Halle and Henry learn how to balance The Challenges of Personal Development at Maple Hills while developing new relationships, discovering their true identities, and pursuing their artistic and athletic dreams.

As is true of the Icebreaker and Wildfire novels, the campus and sports elements of Daydream complicate Halle and Henry’s evolution from friends to lovers. Each installment in the series delves into new characters’ internal dilemmas and experiences to explore the complexities of falling in love during transitional phases of adult life.