Thanks Netgalley and the publisher for the EARC!
There were a lot of characters which made it difficult for me to keep them straight. I had a hard time getting into the story

I won't be releasing this review publicly as I haven't been able to finish the book. I read 10% of the book and I just was not hooked at all. I had a hard time following who the characters were - and the general impression I got from main character Holly is that she dislikes all the men, loves her women, and has weird guard rails set up about who she can hook up with which is primarily any coworkers, but also seems to include the firemen from across the street? Because.... she's got low impulse control? But she's also described as someone who always thinks everything through? And then the gentleman she hooked up with, he assures us that he followed all her rules - that he would also avoid her, not speak about their time together.... except the minute he runs into her, he keeps winking and making innuendoes and then immediately talks about it with one of his coworkers.

Maybe if I'd read earlier books in the series, it would have been easier to keep track of all the characters *and* be invested in this romance despite the main characters coming across as generally prickly and unlikeable or contradictory right off the bat? DNR'd this. Thank you for the opportunity to read it, sorry that it just was not for me.

Many thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the arc. Oof, this one was tough. I don't love DNFing arcs (I try to avoid it entirely), but sometimes a book is just not good, and you gotta protect your time and mental health these days. I'm a character-driven reader, so if I can't connect with the characters (or outright dislike them), then I'll drop a book faster than if it has a boring plot. This one had too many characters, for starters, and it drowned out Anya and Owen. Furthermore, the dynamic between Anya and Owen was far too repetitive. It was like reading the same conflict for pages and pages and chapters and chapters. Not worth it.

I want to start by saying I loved the blurb presented to me for this book. I love anything written with firefighters. And accidental pregnancies? Count me in.

But Anya just didn’t do it for me. I felt like the majority of the book was her pushing Owen away. She was insecure and wouldn’t give him the benefit of the doubt. Unfortunately for the amount of this book she kept these insecurities going, I couldn’t back her up.

I really liked Owen and I think patience was a big characteristic of his. I liked his ability to love wholeheartedly and I felt for him most of the time reading this book.

Now to the side characters—I was exhausted trying to constantly remember who is who throughout the story. And the way Anya portrayed the men married to her friends really made me not want to connect with any of the other men in the story. I was constantly trying to keep up with who was taking, who was related to whom and where someone fell on the friend chain. I hadn’t read any of the other stories and I wonder if that would have made a difference.

In the end, I’d give this 2.75/5. Like I said, I wanted to like this story. But it didn’t do it for me and it was awfully long for me. It felt drawn out and I would have loved more maturity in the female character.

Thank you Netgally for gifting me this advanced copy.

The Last One by AS Kelly

Love at Last #4

What's a romance without the drama? Beats me bc TLO was full of it! This is my second read after I read the ARC for Book 3 last year and I liked the couples and the expression of trauma and difficulties of pushing past your past to find a brighter future. I only want good things for Anya and Owen.

What I didn't like: Niall and Tyler's constant meddling, I was really sick of Niall by about 30% in and just wanted to skip over all his parts. Total golden retriever type but the annoyingly clingy one.

Thanks Netgalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

I found this book hard to get through because there were so many characters to follow and they all seemed fairly similar in personality and names...? Though I do understand that if I had read the other books in the series, I may have had an easier time keeping track of everyone. I also did not really enjoy Anya, as I found her thoughts and reasoning annoying to listen to. I liked Owen, I just didn't like Owen with Anya and I didn't feel like Anya developed as a character throughout her book. The plot is cute and fun to read, but I just think there are easier to read and more compelling romantic comedy books you could read.

This cover pulled me in! A firefighter romance? Yes please. And although the character appeared pregnant, and a pregnancy trope is a no for me, I still gave this a go! I wished I had recognized that this was part of a character series before starting, but that was an oversight for me. I was able to enjoy this as a standalone but if I had read the other stories, I may have connected more.

This was a fantastic read. This author will pull you into her stories and keep you on the edge of your seat. I can't wait for the rest of the books.

Decided to give another book in this series a go because I just love the idea of the small town fire department angle and this just.... wasn't it.

I'm glad I had read at least one other book in the series and had been previously introduced to the characters because if not I would have felt completely lost at the number of new people being introduced in the beginning. And while the friend group was nosy but endearing in the 3rd book of this series, in this book they were downright intrusive and insensitive of Anya and Owen wanting to work things out on their own timeline.

I was excited to get more of Anya because in the last book she was portrayed as a powerhouse woman who takes no shit but that attitude was far less endearing as a main character. 97% of the book felt like unnecessary conflict that could have been avoided with some therapy. With that much push and push (I can't even say push and pull it was truly just her pushing the male MC away the entire time), the ending felt flat and unresolved.

The author also often included character's inner thoughts right in with the dialogue, so sometimes it was hard to determine what was being said out loud vs. in a monologue.

Unfortunately I couldn't quite connect with this one. There were SO many characters (I lost count at 6? aside from the MCs.) and I couldn't keep track of who was who, who was connected to whom, and why we were supposed to be interested in them. It distracted me and I mostly felt lost.

Along with that, I couldn't get invested in the main story. It was established very quickly that the MCs had an explosive one night stand but Anya is firmly against any relationship even though Owen is infatuated with her. It went on like that, over and over, for chapter after chapter. Even the big news didn't really change the gist of the story for a very long time. Anya seemed very hard and I didn't see enough hints at a deeper interior to start to care for her. For most of the book, there wasn't really much to Owen besides him being a new-in-town firefighter who was attracted to Anya. Again, it was hard to develop concern for him.

I should note that I'm an American reader and this story takes place in Ireland. There were a lot of references to locales and pop culture that didn't resonate with me. It may be easier for a reader more familiar with the setting to identify with the story.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review.

2 Stars This is the fourth standalone book in an interconnected series. I love a pregnancy trope book, but there were a few things in this one that made the story hard to follow or understand. It is a standalone, but with all of the secondary characters from previous books and their interconnected stories, it seems almost vital to have read those books first to understand who is who, what each character is like, and their relationships with each other. I haven’t read the other books and was definitely confused, even though the characters were introduced and their relationships were explained, I still felt like I didn’t know enough. There’s also a lot of dialogue in the story, so much so that there isn’t enough of the characters’ inner thoughts to understand their feelings and motivations. I couldn’t really understand why the main characters were attracted to each other in the first place or why the heroine, Anya, was reluctant to be in a relationship with the hero, Owen.

Overall, it was a cute story and I appreciated the dual first-person POV.

This book was okay! I got a little lost in the back and forth, and it was mostly dialogue without a lot of description. I can see how this format could really work for a reader, but I don't think I was that reader. The pacing was incredibly fast, which is interesting for such a long book. It was, however, very well translated and I liked the overall plot! It was fun and relatively light. I would probably recommend this to my friends.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

To be honest, I was entirely swayed by the cover; I had not heard of this series before, but I love a good fireman romance, so one look and I was sold!! However, I've come away feeling kinda disappointed.

To be perfectly honest, I hated Anya as a character. Her emotional hang-ups, while understandable, were so dominating in her chapters that I found myself more annoyed with her than sympathetic. She was an intensely judgmental character, which in turn was seriously hypocritical because she was terrified of being judged by everyone around her, even her "closest" friends. Her distrust in men—which, again, could in theory be justified by her past—was far beyond anything I would consider normal; it was so intense and constantly reinforced that, in my opinion, it toed the line of misandry. And when you're so far gone down that path, it makes a happy ending really hard to believe.

And while I love stories revolving around friend groups, I found the whole group in this story to be TOO nosy. Like, privacy was nonexistent; the second something happened, practically all the secondary characters knew about it... which totally ruined the credibility of Anya's distrust. Her girlfriends, who supposedly tell their husbands/boyfriends everything, DIDN'T talk to them about her constant doubting of Owen's affection for HER as well as the baby?? I find that so hard to believe. Because honestly, if they HAD, Owen could have approached her much sooner about his intentions and feelings (like, 100 pages earlier, which would've been great) and they could have resolved everything much more maturely. The fact that she was still doubting him 90+% into the book was too much for me (the fact that she thought he was cheating?? just goes to show how truly insecure she was as a character). Her lack of trust in herself and everyone around her really ruined the story for me.

In terms of plot, despite the characterization, I enjoyed it; the writing was a bit too dialogue-heavy at points; and I really would recommend reading the other books before this one because it's so. damn. exhausting. to keep up with all the characters and relationships. I don't think any of those things really make up for Anya as a protagonist for me though. So overall, like I said, I came away disappointed. I definitely won't be picking up the other books in the series, and I'm not inclined to read anything else by this author.

2.75 out of 5 stars, ★★★☆☆

A great cliché narrative about an age gap couple and unexpected pregnacy. I like this kind of trope, and altough this book have started a little bit confusing, in the 40% of the story I was totally involved with already. Anya is a tough character, and her sttuborn behavior drove me nuts, especially when Owen was so solicite and loving, and He is the main perfect Man someone would wnat to share a life.but I could relate with her insecurities sometimes and this made me understand her quite well.. I Liked a lot the story.

This book was confusing from the jump. None of the characters made sense and very few of their actions were understandable. I got through the book but I kinda wish I hadn't read it. It was not for me at all.. Maybe it was because I haven'tread any of the other stories but Anya was unlikable to the entreme and the perspective of the story left us as much in the dark as the characters in the book.

I had a very difficult time connecting with this book. I'm normally a huge fan of the pregnancy & forced proximity tropes, but this book just missed the mark for me. the characters barely had chemistry. Anya just felt a little whiny. She was in her late 30s acting very childish. Owen was amazing, but I was not convinced the main characters belong together. Overall, it was a little boring & just fine.

The Last One Book Review - ⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

First of all, thank you NetGalley and A.S. Kelly for an eARC of The Last One in exchange for an honest review! Second, all thoughts and opinions are my own.

Incredibly independent, Anya is the queen of one night stands and knows one thing for absolute certain: love does not exist. When one night with Owen turns into a weekend Anya isn’t worried - after all, he’s leaving town, right?

But when a full-time position at the local fire station becomes available, Anya’s worst fears become a reality. And just when she thinks things couldn’t get any worse, two pink lines affect her relationship with Owen, forever.

This story follows a man who wants for nothing more than for Anya to open up to him, and a woman determined to deter him at every opportunity.

While advertised as a stand-alone novel, The Last One is the fourth book in the Love at Last Series by A.S. Kelly. Personally, I feel it’s necessary to read the other books in the series prior to reading this one as I found myself struggling to piece together the relationship dynamics and backstories of the other characters who seemed extremely developed already.

I hesitated to give this story three stars, but felt that while it was not my favorite, it was an easy read that kept me engaged until about the halfway point. While I loved the premise of the story, I found myself wanting to know more about Anya from the start. I struggled to understand why she had sworn off of men and while I was able to piece it together, I felt that as a reader I was expected to just “know” what was going on. I fell in love with Owen and Anya and was pulling for them from the very beginning but started to lose interest in their relationship the more Anya pushed Owen away.

The more I got to know Anya as a character the less I liked her. She was extremely distrustful, sometimes rude to her friends, and had a very negative outlook on life. As a result it made it hard for me to feel any connection to her and to want to see her get a happy ending since she seemed intent on destroying every happy thing in her life.

As I haven’t read the first three books in this series, it’s hard to say if my perspective would have been different with some additional background, but at the end of the day this book just left me wanting more. More trust. More dates. More romance. More banter. More growth.

The Last One- A.S Kelly

⭐️⭐️⭐️

This book hit home; my first child was conceived with only being with my partner 6 months. On birth control, having a period throughout our relationship and condoms but Kai came into the world. While I relate so much to the main character I couldn’t stand her. 90% of the book she was being a total A hole and everyone kissed her ass. I’m not exaggerating until 90% of the book she was STILL so negative about herself, her future and her friends. Owen was truly amazing. Dream lover. I really wish we could’ve seen the relationship evolve not just with buying a house but like the actual birth of the baby??? Why not add that ugh.

Ps: firefighter and school teacher type of things 👀

I want to start off with the positive, and say that I loved the plot of this book. The town seems adorable and I love that the friend group is so close, all work together, and make a point to spend time together each week.

But, this book was a whirlwind and super chaotic. This one was tough for me. We are introduced to a LOT of characters very quickly, but don't get an explanation of who they all are and how they're entwined until chapter six. I feel like that information would have been helpful to have right off the bat! Then, throughout the book, those characters are EVERYWHERE. They're super meddlesome, and not in a funny/this is cute kind of way, but to the point it's totally overwhelming. At times in the conversations, there are multiple people talking but the dialogue isn't clear on who is saying what. I had to reread several conversations. Anya is unlikable. Like, no redeeming qualities. Usually by the end of a book with an unlikeable character, they've come to their senses. She's just awful the entire time. Owen is in way over his head and lets all of their "friends" manipulate him. He has no backbone. Anya (and everyone else) walks alllll over him. The only two characters I didn't dislike were Holly and Jordan. I also can't get over how many times in the book they referred to firefighters as stupid, useless, etc. I think in this friend group it was some kind of inside joke but it was way overused.

If you're used to a typical romance plot of meet cute, falling, conflict, and resolution... this isn't it. This one starts after they've met, is 95% conflict, and ends suddenly. I had high hopes for this book but suffice to say it didn't live up to my expectations.

Thank you to NetGalley & the publisher for providing me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
3.5 Stars
This book wasn’t bad but it wasn’t the best. The small town vibe was great and I loved the duel point of views. I enjoyed the friendships everyone had. I like how they all could joke around with each other and not take offense. I think Anya’s history should have been talked about sooner. Her “ I don’t trust men” comment was made way too much, and was a bit annoying. Anya’s distrust and dislike of men is understandable but when it extended to her friends husband it was a bit extreme and insupportable. Although maybe if I read the other books in the series I would think differently. I’m not sure how I feel about Anya and Owen’s relationship. It was cute, but I also feel really bad for Owen and the way he was treated. I wish that we could have seen their life after having the baby. Overall this was an okay book.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/4870180715