I will buy & read every book that K.L. Walther writes. From the t-swift & schitt’s creek references to the family and romantic relationships in this book… I’m swooning. I’m always here for a good YA romance but so far the 2 books that I’ve read by this author have been my favorite. 3.5 ⭐️

This was a sweet second chance romance that had me smiling and giggling the entire way. I loved the Swiftie references, the dynamic between Tag and Alex, and most importantly the second chance romance aspect. The character development wasn’t deep but overall this was a great feel good read perfect for a summer day.

In K.L. Walther's newest YA novel we follow Lily Hopper who is just finishing up her senior year at her boarding school. Every year one member of the senior class is anonymously elected to be the "Jester" and organizes the senior prank at the end of the year. Lily receives a note from this year's Jester asking if she wants to help execute the prank. Lily agrees to participate and finds out that this year's Jester is her ex-boyfriend Taggart Swell who she still has feelings for. Throughout the obstacles that lay between them and the execution of the prank they interfere with a lot of rules and start to get closer for the first time since they broke up. Will they pull off the prank without being caught? Or better yet, could Tag potentially still have feelings for Lily too??
I usually try to read less YA love stories nowadays since I feel like I've outgrown the genre a smidge but I made an exception for this one and I thought it was absolutely adorable. I thought all the characters were extremely likeable and the story felt genuine. Some of the flashback scenes between Tag and Lily when they were first a couple were SO ADORABLE. It made me wish that there was another book that followed them getting together the first time as well. Although I loved a number of different aspects of this book, BY FAR my favorite part was all the Taylor Swift references. There were so many and I had such a fun times reading carefully to try to find them as I went. Below is a compiled list of all the references I found. Even if you aren't a huge fan of YA romances, if you are a Taylor Swift fan I highly recommend picking this up!!

When high school senior Lily Hopper receives a note from the infamous Jester asking for help pulling off the traditional end of year prank, Lily agrees to help in a desperate attempt to ditch her good girl reputation. This year’s Jester turns out to be Lily’s ex-boyfriend, Tag Swell, whom Lily still has feelings for. Tag’s prank involves stealing the yearbooks and forcing the senior class president, who also happens to be Lily’s prom date, to go on an epic scavenger hunt to retrieve the yearbooks. As Tag, Lily, and their fellow pranksters hide clues across campus in the middle of the night whilst dodging campus security, Tag and Lily start to feel sparks again. But will old hurt prevent Lily and Tag from rekindling their relationship?

What Happens After Midnight is a YA second chance romance with hints of mystery elements. The plot was reminiscent of books like Since You’ve Been Gone and Take Me Home Tonight by Morgan Matson, 11 Paper Hearts by Kelsey Hartwell, I Kissed Shara Wheeler by Casey McQuiston, P.S. I Still Love You by Jenny Han, Paper Towns by John Green, as well as Margot Mertz Takes It Down by Carrie McCrossen and Ian McWethy. Additionally, the boarding school gave me major Zoey 101 vibes and Lily’s relationship with her mother was similar to Rory and Lorelai’s relationship in Gilmore Girls. What Happens After Midnight is a perfect summer read for YA fans, especially high school seniors! Some themes and topics present include revenge, love and heartbreak, self esteem, identity, growing up, friendship, good versus bad, and diabetes.

Firstly, I loved all the references that Walther makes to some of my favourite topics—Taylor Swift and Schitt’s Creek—as I felt like this helped draw me into the novel and connect with the main characters. The end of school year vibe and the beachside, boarding school setting was enjoyable as it was seasonally appropriate and perfect for summertime reading. I liked how the book was broken up into different sections based on the scavenger hunt clues as this made the book easier to follow and read, plus the beautiful cover really matched the vibe of the book.

I was a bit disappointed that What Happens After Midnight was geared towards a younger YA audience as opposed to Walther’s 2021 novel, The Summer of Broken Rules. Even though the Jester’s prank was originally intriguing, I felt like the scavenger hunt itself was kind of underwhelming and I was disappointed that most of the Jester’s “fools” didn’t really participate (for example, one of the participants is sick and ends up spending the entire prank in the restroom).

Overall, I enjoyed this book; I thought that it was an easy, fun, and summery read that teen and YA readers should definitely add to their summer TBR lists!

Filled with Taylor Swift references, I absolutely devoured this book! Lily and Tag are the perfect second chance lovers, and I loved everything about this book!
- The premise: a campus wide Jester event that details a midnight scavenger hunt with clues and friends along the way. Yep. Sign me up.
- The characters: Lily and her mom had the perfect Gilmore Girls relationship, with their quick banter and their relationship. I also adored the friendships that made this book perfect.
- Lily and Tag: So what, I love a YA book. Lily and Tag were a great couple and I loved getting to know them. Their problems felt a little juvenile, but its a YA book, so who am I to complain?
- The References: The TS and SC references will live rent free in my brain forever. Some of them felt forces, but I simply don't care. It was magical.
There was crack in this book. I loved every minute of it. Thank you for this ARC in exchange for a review!

Do you like Schitts Creek references? Do you like Taylor Swift references? What about senior prank antics? Then this book is for you!

Lily Hopper is a senior with just two weeks left until graduation when her ex boyfriend pulls her into an elaborate senior prank to steal the school’s yearbooks. As they spend the night planting clues around campus the two exes quickly realize that their flame may still be burning.

I loved this book so much. I am a huge fan of it all takes place in one night books and this one didn’t let me down. All the relationships in this book felt so real and I loved the chemistry between Tag & Lily.

Thank you, thank you, thank you to NetGalley & Sourcebooks Fire for an advanced copy of this book.

What Happens After Midnight is my second K. L. Walther book and I enjoyed it quite a lot!

Want to mention this at the start, but as a Swiftie, it was easy to pick up on the Taylor Swift references and have a blast having your own scavenger hunt for them.

The plot is easy to digest and fun to read, but sometimes I felt like the pacing of the story was a little off. This is a story of last school days, having to say goodbye to everything you've ever known. It's also about second chance love and friendships, finding your people. I really liked Lily and Tag, and their chemistry was palpable to me.

I do think I liked Summer of Broken Rules a bit more, but that doesn't mean this book isn't worth picking up!

Thank you Netgalley and Sourcebooks Fire for the eARC of this book!

So many Taylor Swift references, literally so many. But I did really enjoy reading this prank war meets scavenger hunt novel. The private school setting mixed with the chaos of the end of a school year was the perfect backdrop for the story and contributed to the reconciliation of Lily and Tag. Young love is just so sweet, especially when they were your first. Plus graduating from high school always feels like such a rite of passage and K.L. Walther capitalizes on that nostalgia perfectly. I couldn't put it down!

*Thank you to Sourcebooks Fire and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for my honest review*

This is hands down one of my favorite YA romances. The chemistry between Lily and Tag was so adorable and wholesome. I was intrigued by the premise of the book and it far exceeded my expectations. It was sweet, sometimes suspenseful, and had me rooting for the main characters from the beginning. I highly recommend this book if you're looking for a cute YA romance.
Thank you Netgalley and Sourcebooks Fire for the ARC!

thank you netgalley for the arc!

Self-proclaimed goody two shoes Lily Hopper is still quietly heartbroken over her breakup with her ex-boyfriend the charismatic and well-liked Taggert Swell. Soon, an opportunity arises for the two to cross paths once more by dint of a yearly tradition of an end-of-year prank, where a senior student is elected to execute said prank under the guise of the alias, Jester. Growing up within the privileged boarding school of Ames where Lily's mother has worked essentially all of Lily's life, Lily's childhood has been a singularly charming tapestry wherein she's been raised by the many faculty members. Her school-life and home life are irrevocably intertwined and this, for me, was the real selling point here. That and Lily's deeply supportive and communicative relationship with her mother. The romance itself, ironically, was for me a Titanic level sinking ship from the get-go.

If you're in search of a story with a didactic purpose or even one with much depth - What Happens After Midnight is not that. This is a a very no-frills second-chance romance, replete with pop culture references to Schitt's Creek and Taylor Swift as well as a super Gilmore Girl's Lorelai and Luke coded pairing, you get what you see in the synopsis. On that note, I've seen it mentioned and have to agree that the synopsis discloses wayyy too much; in effect it's kind of like one of those movie trailers where you watch a 2 minute clip and you've pretty much seen the whole film already. Given that not much really goes on within the story, this oversight isn't as detrimental as it could have perhaps been. The stakes are low, arguably far too low; I know this is more of a cozy read but then we also have the contradiction of all this angst in the relationship between Taggert and Lily which I will get to shortly. You either stick with the angst and raise the stakes or do the inverse, otherwise you wind up with a very self-conscious storyline that's not quite sure what to make of itself.

Pacing was another noticeable issue, I really had to slough through the whole setting up the prank epoch. I suspect this can be largely attributed to the fact that the events of this book really only take part over a week max which given that this is a second-chance romance was entirely unnecessary. There was so much prior history to mine between Taggert and Lily and their ill-fated tumultuous adolescent relationship. It's hard to be a teenager and it's even harder to be a teenager in crazy euphoric heart-wrenching love; hormones are at an all time high folks, drama sepulchres itself within the love-addled teenager life. Instead we're dragged unceremoniously through this bog of rather dull and overly-theatrical pranking. Seriously what was up with the whole let's act like we're on mission impossible this is life or death level of intrigue behaviour? I did appreciate the representation of diabetes in Taggert and you do get caught up worrying for him throughout so there is tension and some heart-wringing. Just... not enough.

You might argue that the angsty miscommunication trope played out by our lovers is a locus of tension or a stake and to that I say - no, absolutely not. I haven't seen anyone else discuss this but in my eyes Taggert was an extremely disrespectful boyfriend and I'm not sure why Lily then goes on to blame herself for being duly upset at the fact he refuses to stand up for his GIRLFRIEND. There are some instances which take place before the actual story that are discussed which I'd vehemently maintain skirt around some emotional cheating. As I'm the only one to bring this to light, it might be my own interpretation but nevertheless, this was what viciously murdered/brutalized the Love Story (taylor swift reference see i can do it too!!) for me. Given that this is in fact a romance novel and I cared not a mite what happened to our dear Lily the uncommunicable bore and Taggert the rake, you can see why I've rated this so low.

I'd like to add a disclaimer that there's a lot of potential here and Walther is certainly a gifted writer with a prettily modest style, irrespective of how I feel towards the application of her gifts.

Calling the Swifties! Sit down and see if you can find all the Taylor Swift references sprinkled throughout this book.

This is a cozy and fun read of friendship, senior year, second chance romance, and pulling a senior prank. I liked Tag and Lily’s relationship. Although Lily really irked me at times.
The majority of the story happens over the course of a single night and then the after affects unfold over the following couple days. So it’s a fast and lighthearted read.

Lily and her mom’s relationship definitely seems to be modeled after Gilmore Girls. Which means, it comes with its flaws but is overall a close and loving relationship.

This was a fun read but pretty cheesy and juvenile (yes I know it’s YA but it was just a little too much for me). I don’t see myself reading this one again but I definitely had a good time noticing all the T.S. References.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the ARC! This one comes out later this month :)

I've always been a fan of the cozy/homey boarding school vibes, and WHAM made for an endearingly easy summer read. This book didn't hit quite like The Summer of Broken Rules, but it made for a quick, fun read nonetheless. I feel like the whole plot can best be described as "sweet but vague"; you don't really know enough to know why you should be rooting for Tag & Lily, you just know that you should. I'm also not a huge fan of the miscommunication trope, and this one in particular made Lily seem a tad self-involved and annoying, but not entirely unbearable??
You can get through the book pretty fast, but it just leaves you wanting more. There are no whys to ground anything, so it just feels a bit odd...like you're floating along this river and it's pleasant enough, but you don't really know what you're doing here.

The TS references were a bit too blatant for my taste in this one, and to be honest they'd kind of take me out of the story, especially towards the 2nd half.
The secondary characters were pretty well done though, and they were probably my favourite part of the story overall. (Although I have noticed a weird trend of having 3rd tier brown side characters in contemporary YA reads lately, which I find a little strange. Either integrate them into the crew or just don't write them in at all, you know? I'd take no rep over forced diversity any day ☺)

Thanks to Sourcebooks Fire and NetGalley for the ARC!

𝘗𝘢𝘶𝘴𝘦𝘴, 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘴𝘢𝘺𝘴, 𝘠𝘰𝘶'𝘳𝘦 𝘮𝘺 𝘣𝘦𝘴𝘵 𝘧𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘥
𝘈𝘯𝘥 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘬𝘯𝘦𝘸 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘪𝘵 𝘸𝘢𝘴, 𝘏𝘦 𝘪𝘴 𝘪𝘯 𝘭𝘰𝘷𝘦.

To every author who has even written a book set in boarding school - I love you and thank you ♡

Ames school has a history of engaging in senior year pranks. Each year a Jester is chosen to end the year off with fun and this time Tag's it.

As Tag, Lily and their friends conduct a campus wide hunt for clues, their past gets rehashed and some painful and some sweet memories are dredged up.

- ~ -

𝘞𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘏𝘢𝘱𝘱𝘦𝘯𝘴 𝘈𝘧𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘔𝘪𝘥𝘯𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵 is a sweet and nostalgic read. It's a story that brings up teary goodbyes, the uncertainty and longing for school life as well as the roaring laughter, midnight confessions, first kisses and first break-ups (all in good memories).

This story gave off such enchanting vibes, like The million and one Taylor Swift references combined with the thrill of a midnight goose chase and a second chance between two people who never stopped loving each other >>>

Despite all the good thing I have to say, I should also mention that I didn't like the way the story ended, like the author ended it with uncertainty about their futures and that for me took away some of the fun.

- ~ -

4.01 / 5✩

𝘛𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘬𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘚𝘰𝘶𝘳𝘤𝘦𝘣𝘰𝘰𝘬𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘕𝘦𝘵𝘨𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘦𝘺 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘷𝘪𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘯 𝘢𝘥𝘷𝘢𝘯𝘤𝘦𝘥 𝘤𝘰𝘱𝘺 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘣𝘰𝘰𝘬, 𝘸𝘩𝘪𝘤𝘩 𝘐 𝘷𝘰𝘭𝘶𝘯𝘵𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘭𝘺 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘥 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘳𝘦𝘷𝘪𝘦𝘸𝘦𝘥. 𝘈𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩𝘵𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘰𝘱𝘪𝘯𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘮𝘺 𝘰𝘸𝘯.

I loved the Summer of Broken rules and was really looking forward to another book by K L Walther! This one left a little wanted, though.

It was a super fun, lighthearted and cute story — boarding school, senior pranks, nighttime hijinks and adventure, plus a second chance romance! For me, I need a lot of “flashbacks” to get into a second chance romance. There was a bit here that made me root for Lily and Tag, but I needed more to be fully invested in why they should get back together.

This one’s for the swifties, too! There were a LOT of Taylor Swift references and i’m sure I didn’t catch them all. The ones that I did catch were really obvious, and felt a bit forced/unnatural. It felt like it was specifically written to include the reference, and didn’t flow, so I wasn’t too crazy about that. Bigger fans might enjoy finding those though!

I ended up giving this one 3.5 stars, and would recommend it for a quick read!

This book may seem like the standard, cute YA romance but it varies in many ways. I really enjoyed the love story of Lily and Tag and the way they communicated their feelings towards the end of the book. It included a lot of intriguing suspense, with a soothing feeling of homey-ness. I found myself smiling more often than I expected. I adored this story and would absolutely recommend it!

This was a light hearted fun read. I am a sucker for an entertaining book set at a boarding school.
What made this one fun was the race around campus to hide clues for a scavenger hunt - all between midnight and sunrise without getting caught by campus security. The characters were also fun and interesting - the chemistry was good.
Other than race against the clock, the main component of the plot was the second-chance romance between Lily and Tag. This was interesting and resolves itself well. The one thing that bothered me about this was the reason for the break up in the first place. I am not a fan of “miscommunication” or lack thereof. When so much could be avoided if they just talked. Fortunately, this does not take away from the adventures of the night, so I was still able to enjoy this book while not being overly annoyed. Will all this in mind, I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a fun ya romance/mini-adventure story.

After greatly enjoying K.L. Walther’s The Summer of Broken Rules, I was eager to get my hands on What Happens After Midnight! Thank you to Sourcebooks Fire and NetGalley for the digital copy in exchange for an honest review.

Lily is two weeks away from graduation at Ames, a boarding school on the coast of Rhode Island. As one of Ames’s “fac-brats” (child of a faculty member), Lily has a squeaky clean reputation. As her time at school comes to a close, Lily is wondering if she’s missed out on some fun that was to be had. But then she receives a mysterious invitation to join this year’s anonymous senior class prank—lead by the Jester. Putting her Goody Two Shoes inclinations aside, Lily agrees to join the Jester only to find out he is none other than her ex-boyfriend, Tag. Can Lily bear to spend an entire night with Tag to execute the prank when she very much still has feelings for him? And if so, can they traverse campus after midnight without getting caught?

Sadly, this read was not my favorite. While at its core it was a sweet YA romance, one of the very things that had me the most excited to read it (Taylor Swift references)… took me fully out of the story. For those that know me, I am the biggest Swiftie and I love a good Taylor reference in a book but man oh man, this one simply had too many. There were 60+ that I took note of. My main issue with this is that most of them felt dropped into sentences for the sake of adding another tally to the running count, when I felt other words would have made far more sense. What I was hoping would be a fun aspect of the reading experience, instead made me feel exasperated. While I did enjoy other aspects of the story, the references and my repeated exasperation greatly overshadowed the things I did enjoy.

All in all, if you’re looking for a book with Taylor references galore and you enjoy a coming of age romance, then this might be the book for you. Unfortunately, it wasn’t for me.

I picked this up at 10pm, and I didn't put it down until I finished, which I feel should be noted for its ability to keep my attention through the middle of the night.

I loved the concept, the majority of this book taking place over the course of one night as two teens who used to be in love (and maybe still are) execute a senior prank together. And the actual night of the pranking was very fun. But I didn't feel as deep a connection to the main characters as I would like (and have in her previous novel, The Summer of Broken Rules). I feel as though the first 60% was excellent, but the last 40% fell a bit flat for me. That being said, it was overall a fun time, with perhaps TOO many Taylor Swift references (can't believe I'm saying those words).

Rating: 3.75/5

I enjoy a good YA Mystery/Thriller and this one wasn’t exactly in that category but was just as fun! Every year the students of a boarding school pull a senior prank. The leader is called the Jester and gets to pass the honor along to an underclassman. No one knows who the Jester is, unless they recruit helpers.

Lily gets recruited and finds out the Jester is her ex-boyfriend, who she is NOT over. Mix in some highjinks, high school drama and some Taylor Swift references and you’ve got this simple, quick, easy read.

This is the perfect easy summer read. What Happens After Midnight is a cute YA romance. It didn’t blow me away but I still still enjoyed Lily and Tag’s relationship. I think the die hard Swifties might swoon over this one though as there are quite a few references.