I want to start by saying I wish the writer had done more research about trauma victims because so much of this was really off kilter about how survivors of violent crime process their experiences.

However, purely based on the story being intriguing and so out of pocket and wild, I really enjoyed it! It was full of dread, lots of red herrings and just overall intrigue. I read it in about 24 hours because I just kept wanting to finish one more chapter!

Thank you to NetGalley, the author, and the publisher for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I wanted to like this book so much. It instantly grabbed my interest when I heard about it. A queer slasher book? yesssss.

but it missed it’s mark sadly :( I found the main characters one dimensional and dull. The storyline was kind of a mess and repetitive. I just felt like there was room for so much more character development and for more explanation to the plot and some of the characters’ motives.

While this book wasn’t really for me, I think Jennifer Dugan’s writing style is great for some. The scenery and aesthetics of the camp and the gore were all there. I just didn’t enjoy or connect with Sloan & Cherry quite like I’d hoped I would.

A big thank you to Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers & NetGalley for the arc!

I rarely read rom coms but when I do, they're usually by Jennifer Dugan. She does an excellent job at writing cute queer fiction so I was especially excited when I learned she wrote a book closer to my genre of choice.

Last Girls Standing does something I feel like I'm actively seeing a lot more of in fiction. The aftermath of a slasher event. It's come and gone and we are now buried deep in the trauma of the main characters.

For Dugan's new book, it's a summer camp blood bath. We follow mainly Sloan who can't remember the night several people came with animal masks to kill counselors. She was saved by Cherry, her girlfriend.

While I respect what Dugan was trying to do, I think the novel truly failed. To the point, I felt uncomfortable by the end with how she portrayed someone with trauma. Everyone experiences trauma differently so I'd like to hear more opinions but it felt as if this trauma was an inciting incident that leads to Sloan murdering someone.

The plot was unevenly paced and about half way through I just wanted the "big reveal." It was consistently repetitive and slow in such a way I thought we'd really get to know fully developed characters but we didn't.

This is a shame because I'm always looking for YA genre fiction featuring queer characters. Here we have this horror flavored Sapphic mystery but every twist and turn felt like an annoyance. It really makes me hesitant to share because the readability was challenging due to its repetitive nature then I'd like to hear more opinions on the portrayal of trauma.

Thank you to G.P. Putnam’s Sons and NetGalley for the eARC of The Last Girls Standing in exchange for my honest review.

This, unfortunately, did not work for me at all. It had a really interesting premise and I thought that it was going to be something fully different. The pacing was super clunky and didn’t keep me engaged even though it was pretty short. I know this was meant to show the dangers/toxicity of trauma bonding, but it just left me feeling uncomfortable.

This book had a very interesting premise, and I enjoyed that immensely. It was great to have a a queer young adult book that was also a thriller.

Absolutely loved this book! As a horror fan it brought all of my favorite aspects from slashers and psychological and blended them together beautifully!
This book truly makes you feel like you can't trust anyone, and that was probably one of my favorite things about it!

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC. I was really excited about the premise of this novel, the aftermath of a summer camp massacre. I’m a fan of this type of film, and this is a different perspective I was eager to read. That said, I just didn’t connect with the characters or storyline. However, the pace picks up in the middle, which kept me reading, to the end, which was shocking.

“The Last Girls Standing” by: Jennifer Dugan

When something traumatic happens, how does it mold and shape the lives of those who survive? How do their loved ones learn to love them as the new people that they have become?
Sloan and her girlfriend Cherry are the only two to survive a massacre at the camp they were supposed to have been counselors at for the summer. Sloan, however, does not remember that night. Cherry has supplied the account of what happened. They agreed there are no secrets between them.
Except.
Except Sloan is starting to remember things, different things. Things that do not match up to Cherry’s timeline of events. What really happened that night?
Onto my portion of the review. I liked this book. The author does a good job of weaving the story together. 3.5 stars.

Thanks to G.P. Putnam's Sons Books and NetGalley for advanced copy for honest review. This review is based on uncorrected text.

You just graduated high school. The summer before starting your freshman year at college. Getting your bearings and earning some credit as a camp counselor, Sloan Thomas was doing just that. Thrilled to be getting away from her parents for the first time at Camp Money Springs. Freedom! A day late, Sloan shows up to meet the other counselors and she spots HER - Cherry, a beautiful, charasmtic girl. She has all the feels knowing this will be a great summer! All ten counselors getting ready to open to campers in just days when the unimaginable happens and the nightmares begin. All the screams. All the noises. Being dazed and confused. Waking up in the hospital Sloan is getting 16 stitches, but it could have been much worse. She is alive. One of two alive. She remembers bits and pieces, the snap of a twig and the glint of silver, but that is literally all she can remember. She has Beth, her 'not a real therapist' trying to help navigate her back through that night, but to no avail. Now to get to the ending is where I am stopping with no spoilers. The ending (uncorrected) will have you guessing till the mind blowing end! Not what I expected! 4 Stars, recommend!

I have so few and yet some many thoughts about The Last Girls Standing. This was my first Jennifer Dugan book, despite her popularity and previous successes. And while this books certainly had potential, it very much fell flat for me.

The concept of the book is good. It follows a trauma bonded couple after they become the sole survivors of a mass murder. Things about the murder aren’t adding up and Sloan turns on Cherry, leaving the reader to piece together the clues and follow Sloan as she figures out what really happened.. The plot was well considered and thought out in that respect. But the execution left me wanting and bursting with frustration. For a debut in thriller novels, it was a bold choice that just missed its potential. The book had too much going on at once and the ending. THE ENDING. So anticlimactic.

My biggest let down with this one was the pacing. The book was 80% over before the action really kicked into gear. That first 80% was mostly Sloan and Cherry having the same argument again…and again…and again. The characters themselves felt one dimensional, underdeveloped, and vaguely boring. Their overall voices were too close to differentiate at times and I just couldn’t get myself to care about them enough to be fully immersed in the book. I spent so much time frustrated by them and their interactions, that I missed whole paragraphs of text and had to reread them. The lack of communication in their relationship made sense with the thriller element of the book and the need to keep the reader guessing, but it was hard to get past.

I did like how this book deals with showing multiple reactions to trauma. I like that Sloan’s response is so different than Cherry’s, though we get far more of Sloan’s as the narrator. It brings to light how differently people process things, but definitely didn’t show PTSD in full. It felt very tiptoed around. I wish the author had spent more time developing those experiences and honing in on them.

Overall, I was very disappointed in this one. Not something I feel like I would recommend to others, though I would potentially pick up a book by this author in another genre.

What started off as a promising read dissolved into a bit of a disappointing one. There are a lot of elements about this book that I enjoyed at first: the unreliable narrator, the unfolding mystery, the homage to 80s/90s summer camp slasher vibes. But unfortunately, this book really struggled with pacing for me. Some parts were drawn out to the point of excess and other parts I wish we had spent more time on. It felt like we just kept going back and forth through the same cycle of events with no real movement forward. And the resolution itself left me with so many unanswered questions and a sour taste in my mouth about the depiction of trauma and trauma processing as a whole. I think the premise was interesting and that was what made me want to read the book...but around the midway point, my curiosity was just not enough to keep my interest in this book.

I was really intrigued by the premise here, but it ultimately fell flat for me. More than a final girls story, this seemed more like a psychological thriller with a bait and switch conclusion that was disappointing after investing so much time into the story. I also feel concerned about what message it sends about people with mental illness as a result of trauma.

So I happened to pick up “Melt With You”, a romance book by this author a while ago. Although that book wasn’t for me, I absolutely love seeing authors delve into new genres and styles and I adore a good thriller so I decided to give her debut thriller a try. The cover of this book also really caught my eye!

Unfortunately, after reading it, this book did not at all meet my expectations. It felt like it was being pulled in too many directions ultimately leading to a very anticlimactic ending.

The characters felt a bit one dimensional and I felt little to no investment in any of them or their relationships. Cherry and Sloan were meant to showcase what a trauma bond can look like but I don’t think it was executed as well as it could’ve been. The depictions of trauma were so scattered and at some points just downright strange. I think there definitely could’ve been more research put into what PTSD can look like instead of seemingly throwing different symptoms in and calling it a day. The pacing of the book also felt a bit off with it only really picking up in the last 1/4 and additionally, the cult felt as if it was thrown in as a connection point instead of it playing a huge part in the plot like it was meant to.

Overall I was a little disappointed with this book. However, like I said, this is the author’s first thriller and I have no doubt that with more time and experience in the genre they can only improve!

This one will keep you guessing until the very end. It was a bit of a slow start for me, but once it got going, I was intrigued.
The author is clearly a fan of the horror genre with several classic horror references and tropes throughout. I enjoyed this and would read more by this author.

Thank you so much for the ARC!

This book was definitely interesting, that I can say for sure. I struggled a bit with this book. I felt like it was dragging on when I wanted to get to a resolution or have some answers. I also wasn’t satisfied at all by the ending. However, it did keep me guessing the entire way. Every time I thought I knew where the story was going to go, or who the “bad guy” was I was misdirected. There were some very intriguing aspects of this book, but overall it wasn’t a favorite of mine sadly.

I’m…not really sure what to say about this one. It definitely kept my attention and I was interested to see where it would go, but now I’m left feeling utterly confused and kind of disappointed. I was very excited about this one, a queer slasher thriller set at a summer camp. But it was more about a VERY clingy and codependent relationship between the two survivors of said massacre with a very slow and repetitive pace and a completely unsatisfying ending. I feel like a lot of people are going to be misled by the cover and the synopsis. I absolutely understand the concept of trauma bonding, but Sloan and Cherry’s relationship was just incredibly unsettling and unhealthy and was being portrayed as romantic, which I was not liking. Honestly, the only character I thought was a decent person was poor Connor who was trying to be a good friend to Sloan. Sloan herself, I tried having sympathy and slack for, but she just irritated me for most of the book and Cherry stressed me the hell out with her constant showing up and clinging on to Sloan. If the ending would have gone the way I was hoping, I think I could have forgiven most of these things, but the ending was so ridiculous and made absolutely no sense. This one was definitely a miss for me.
TW: descriptions of mass murder, PTSD, mentions of animal death, death

Thank you to NetGalley and G.P. Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers for an advanced digital reader’s copy in exchange for an honest review.

What a great read. I haven't read from Jennifer Dugan before, but after this one I will be checking out what she puts out in the future. I thought the cover was great, plus the story itself was phenomenal.

I wanted to love this. Hello queer wlw rep in a summer slotted release?! Perfection in theory, not in execution. I re-evaluate all reviews prior to posting final thoughts to socials so I need to sit with this.

Both of the main characters, again, felt unique in their initial description, but the execution made them feel underdeveloped. I want to enjoy the twist but when there's such a lack of connection to the main characters, it's hard to be invested in the stakes, let alone stakes that are sensical. I wanted to read this because the description made it sound like what I'd wanted from the Fear Street movies in a book with more nuance. Fell short for me and that has me torn with the final rating because 2 feels too low yet I don't know if it meets my criteria for a 3 star rating if I'm being completely honest.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this eARC!

I had pretty high hopes for this one, and I’m left feeling more than a little let down. I love a slasher as much as the next guy, but I was really ready to finally read a story about what happens to the final girl after the cameras stop rolling. I expected a story about a survivor reclaiming her life and bonding with her fellow sole survivor, but instead I got… this.

First, let’s talk about what worked: this is a quick, highly binge-able read. In fact, I read about 70% of it in one go. Just like Sloan, I needed to know the truth. What really happened that night? What part did Cherry play in it all? The author does a terrific job of making you fly through the pages to finally put all the pieces together.

What didn’t work was how the pieces fit together in the end. Since the release date is so far away, I’ll try to dance around spoilers, so bear with me. Logically, I can see how the ending makes sense. I definitely see the author’s vision, and I think she definitely told the story she was meaning to tell. I just don’t think it is satisfying, in any way. There is a certain element that makes final girls almost universally appealing, and the author really drives a blade through that element at the end.

Ultimately, I think this book is just trying to do too many things. It’s so short that there is no way to pack in all the character development and the storylines the author is aiming for. I think this is a book with an excellent premise and promising characters, but desperately needs more editing and rewriting.

Also, I would ask that an editor remove the word “junkie” when describing a certain character’s backstory.

I'm sorry but this is quite possibly that absolute worst (and nonsensical) ending to a novel that I have ever suffered through. And I do mean a suffered through it. But now you won't have to!

The first may 20% of the book was good. It had me engaged and wanting to read more and making predictions. And then suddenly...it lost me completely. There are so many irrelevant details included. So many side characters that have absolutely no impact on the story and don't need to be included.

And then there's the ending. The ultimate let down. The unsolved quest for answers. The left field psychotic break. The fade to black finale. The most disappointing ending a "thriller" could have ever provided.