I was able to listen to this in audiobook form thanks to Henry Holt publishing and NetGalley. My Last Innocent Year is a debut novel and well written. The story is about a young woman in her last semester of college in a prestigious school in New Hampshire. The characters were interesting and I thought well described.. The story was good and the main character's actions were what I would expect for a young woman of that time.. There should be several trigger warnings but I managed them. I would recommend this book to most of my reading friends.

An excellent campus novel with a terrific protagonist, whose voice is both unusual and endearing.

I really enjoy a campus novel, but some are better than others from a quality perspective, and this is one of the better offerings from the genre that I’ve recently encountered.

A lovably human and nuanced protagonist is just the start of the good things this book has to offer, along with a sharp and more intricate look at power dynamics and student-teacher relationships. In short, you’ve seen the bones of this plot many times before, but this is a far smarter and more poignantly detailed version of it.

The sense of place here is fantastic, as is this 90s cultural nostalgia that creates a tremendous sense of time and place for the novel.

I highly recommend the audiobook version of this if you’re able to read this way. The narrator is terrific and the pacing is perfect for the format.

3.5 stars rounded up

Thank you NetGalley and MacMillan Audio for the complimentary copy of the audiobook.

Set in 1998 on a small college campus we follow Isabel as she shifts from seeing the world as a child to an adult. A true coming of age story that reminded me a tad of My Dark Vanessa but without the emotional toll that MDV executed on.

If you want a slow, winding character driven coming of age story with several triggers this is the book for you.

In the end I enjoyed the book, but it isn't one I will be shouting from rooftops or pushing into most of my friends hands. This is a book that will have a lot of haters but will also have some that will connect to and love.

My Last Innocent Year succeeds at capturing the feelings of young adulthood and the transitional period between college and "real life." I also think it does fairly well handling tough subject matter. However, for my taste the writing felt a bit young, even for college. I think this would be perfect for someone who normally reads young adult and wants to read more new adult and adult.

Overall an enjoyable read but the story felt too huge and scattered to leave much impact. I found the writing itself lovely and enjoyed Isabel as a character, especially in relation to her friendships. But the more intentionally exciting points of the plot fell flat.

I don't know how to feel about this book. Nothing was particularly good or bad about it. The writing was nice, but the story just wasn't for me.

My favorite quote was "We were girls in the bodies of women. We bought condoms with our father’s credit cards, drank sloe gin fizzes, and slept with stuffed animals on our beds. We didn’t know how to fold a fitted sheet."

Trigger warnings:
Alcohol
Antisemitism (past event mentions students forced to dress in striped pajamas and carry heavy stones)
Blood and stitches (caused by a gin bottle)
Cancer (not a major thing. It's mentioned that someone dies of cancer at another point in time)
Car Accident (results in a death)
Cheating
Fatphobia (fat camp is briefly mentioned)
Kidnapping (a father kidnaps his child)
Miscarriage (not graphic)
Parent death - Isabel's mom died 4 years before the book takes place
Self-Harm (not graphic. There was a mention of the 'wrong way' to cut and how it's attention-seeking)
Sexual Assault (by a 'friend', clearly non-consensual, she asked him to stop and he said he couldn't, he denied it was assault, the main character is also pressured to report and discuss the assault by her friend and principal)
Sex (mildly graphic)
Student / Teacher relationship - This is a pretty large part of the book. She's a college student and over 18. It's not really portrayed as fully positive or negative.
Suicide? (It's unsure if a death was a suicide or accident)

Thanks so much to Macmillan Audio and Netgalley for the gifted advanced audio copy of this book in exchange for my honest thoughts. All opinions are entirely my own. { partner } All of my reviews can also be found on Instagram @Tackling_TBR and on my blog at tacklingtbr.home.blog

TW: rape/sexual assault, implied domestic violence, death/discussion of suicide, kidnapping, infidelity

When I finished this book I wasn't quite sure what to think of it, other than that I liked it overall.

This book felt very slice of life, in the sense that while a lot of things happened in the story it somehow also felt like nothing much had happened by the time I was finished, if that makes sense.
As I'm writing this review about two weeks later it took me a minute or two to remember what all happened in the book, at least enough in order to write about it, but once I did it felt like the entire book down to the smallest details all came flooding back to me.
That has to count for something, right?

I wasn't ever bored while reading this book, but I also didn't feel like I was dying to pick it back up when I needed to put it down. In my opinion, it feels a little bit like a story that you'll only remember as you're reading it or actively thinking back on it, and kind of disappears from memory once it's not right at the forefront of your mind. It was well written, it just didn't really stick with me.

Also worth noting, I listened to this book on audio, and I really enjoyed the performance that the narrator gave. I liked her voice, and she did a good job with the characterizations.

Overall I would recommend this book, but I don't think it'll become a favorite of mine. I will keep my eye on this author, however, because I'd like to see what else she comes out with!
I think that the best way to read this book would be on a drizzly day wrapped in your favorite blanket and coziest sweater.

3.5 stars!
Isabel is in the final semester of her degree at Wilder College when she has a non consensual sexual encounter. The impact of her assault changes her self-image. As she begins her senior writing seminar, she starts a romantic relationship with her professor, further changing her life’s directory.

I did really like Isabel as the protagonist. I thought she was flawed and real. The writing style was poignant and I thought the author was talented, especially for a debut. However, I didn’t love the content of the novel. I wasn’t invested in the subplot and I wanted Isabel’s relationship to be shown in a more negative light with the professor.

This book delves into desire, consent, feminism, and identity. It follows a young girl, in her final year of university, who experiences a weird sexual encounter and then proceeds to fall into an affair with one of her professors.

The concept of this book intrigued me when I first read it (also the cover really drew me in, it mean it's gorgeous), I love anything set on campus and it gave academia vibes. The story is really well written, I thoroughly enjoyed Florins writing style. Now the story itself I have conflicted feelings about. Overall, I enjoyed the book, but I never really related to any of the characters and felt a bit confused/overwhelmed by the multiple plot points. The end seemed a bit rushed, but I liked the beginning and middle.

I would still recommend this read, I loved the points on women empowerment and sexual politics and how the author snuck in some real life political events in the 90s. If you like the academia vibes, and a coming of age story - this is the one for you.

I'll definitely be keeping an eye on Daisy Alpert Florin!

Thank you Netgalley and MacMillan for the audio arc!

I thought this read would be like My Dark Vanessa (by Kate Elizabeth Russell), building the grooming experience, but it felt more like White Ivy (by Susie Yang) – a coming-of-age drama trying to cover so much ground it feels scattered.

It felt like Daisy Alpert Florin was trying to squeeze so many things into her book (rape, death, mental illness, divorce, etc.) that I couldn’t really figure out the direction or point of the book. There were also several characters without enough character building. Overall, the story felt disjointed and directionless.

Sarah Bierstock’s narration was adequate–nice accents, inflections, and interpretation. My only desire would have been for a deeper voice for Isabel’s father Abe. As it was, he sounded like a woman.

I received an ARC from NetGalley.

I really enjoyed this character driven novel. The 90s setting and the beautiful writing were my favorite parts. The pacing was a little slow but I was captivated enough by the main character and the
academia vibes to keep going with it. I listened to the audiobook and thought the narrator did a wonderful job!

In 1998, Isabel graduates Wilder College with a degree in English with some off-charted college experiences. Her senior year is the focus as to not drag out her time there. Going for the full college experience, Isabel finds herself in a situation that she isn’t sure was rape, consensual or somewhere in between. Her friend Deborah, a hardcore feminist, insists it was rape and takes steps to let everyone know what room to steer clear of.
By the time her English Professor doesn’t show up for class, the rumor mill has already been running wild. The man that takes her place leading the class for the semester is older, refined in a rugged way and absolutely handsome. Isabel begins thinking of Mr. R.H. Connelly daily, well beyond the scope of her academics. Eventually, the two begin a whirlwind romance that teaches Isabel things no classroom ever could. By the end so much has changed which signifies the growth that took shape over the weeks and months spent away at college. This book highlights the unfair playing field of men vs women when it comes to sexuality, responsibility and life in general.

Thank you NetGalley, publishers and Daisy Alpert Florin for allowing me to read this advanced copy of My Last Innocent Year.

This was such a beautifully written and thought provoking debut novel! I listened to it as an audio book and it held my attention the entire time.

The book center’s on Isabel Rosen’s senior year at an elite, East Coast college, and chronicles a series of events and relationships that make her reflect on the meaning of adulthood. Set against the unfolding of the Bill Clinton/ Monica Lewinsky scandal, Isabel navigates sexual relationships, friendships, her family’s past, and her own cultural identify.

While I found the plot engaging, what really made this book stand out for me was the beautiful, descriptive language. I also loved that it was told in retrospect by Isabel as a forty something reflecting on her last year in college and what she viewed as the loss of her innocence, in many different senses.

The audio book itself was also well done. The reader handled different accents and dialects well and there was great pacing throughout.

Thank you to @Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Thank you MacMillan audio for the arc.

I love a DEBUT and always love to try a new author. I think this was a solid debut novel that had lots of potential. The audiobook was very easy to breeze through. It’s the kind of book that you can sample and easily tell if you want to continue. The tone is very consistent.

This gave me definite My Dark Vanessa vibes but wasn’t quite as fleshed out as MDV.

It’s a look at desire, control and consent and set during the 90s before the #MeToo movement.

An author to watch out for.

Thank you, Net Galley, for an audio-arc in exchange for an honest review.

In 1998, My Last Innocent Year followed Isabel in her senior year as she navigated a ‘non-consensual’ sexual encounter and later an illicit affair with one of her professors. My Last Innocent Year is an exploration of grief, complicity, and the blurred lines of consent.

I sat on this review for a week to let the book sink in and give it a fair chance before writing a review. I see this book's potential and appeal, but unfortunately, it missed the mark for me.

As an audiobook, I really enjoyed the narrators. This book is approachable and engaging for those who like character-driven novels. I enjoyed the writing style and look forward to more from the author. However, this book didn’t work for me. I felt the characters were underdeveloped, and I never really bought into most of Isabel's relationship dynamics. I felt like the symbolism and metaphors were poorly executed and had the potential to really drive the themes, but it always fell flat. I feel as though character-driven books thrive when the book is actively thought-provocative or this is an explicit 'point' to the story, and I found that this book was very congested and left me wondering what the point was.

I really enjoyed this story set in the 90’s of a college senior, finding herself, and living with unclear boundaries in her relationships. Emotional, I could feel the yearning with every word. Stunning! Great on audio.

Great story, kept my attention throughout following the characters seeming transition into adult decisions and their consequences and in the moment rewards. A reminder for us al

Many thanks for the advanced copy!

I really struggled with this. To start, I don’t share the same view of the author as to what happened between Isabel and Zev. To me, it read like a regretful consensual encounter, not the rape it was made out to be. I also really hated Debra.

1.5.

I enjoyed this book even though the student-professor illicit relationship is a well-covered topic in fiction. The characters were well written and developed, and there was enough of a storyline to keep me going. The author accurately captured the coming of age university mentality of the protagonist figuring out what she wants and deciphering what her actions and the actions of others mean, as well as the consequences.
Thank you to NetGalley for the audiobook ARC.

Isabel attends Wilder College in the 90s and she's in the throes of formative experiences. This story is polished, the writing clean yet emotive, but at times its focus is muddled by a seemingly overwrought plot. A sexual assault and its aftermath, a destructive affair with a visiting professor, a glimpse into a woman fully matured and reflecting on her college years. Isabel's story is a reckoning of how each piece of your life informs and confronts the others.

My Last Innocent Year fits nicely within a club of literature that centers on women behaving in morally suspect ways, women who let their emotions drive their actions, and who are trying to figure out who they are and what they want. This novel reminded me of Vladimir by Julia May Jonas in terms of the college setting and the exploration of sexual politics, but this one has a more naive tone. In fact, I think this one is supposed to highlight that desiring to know more means that things no longer glimmer with possibility. Sometimes knowing the truth or reality of life is to realize it wasn't at all what you thought it'd be or was.

3.5 stars rounded down