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.