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Last of the Autumn Rain
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AWARD-WINNING AUTHOR
"An engrossing tale of an uncanny and sometimes frightening life." — Kirkus Reviews
It was Friday night, September 2, 1983. Julie Cromwell will never forget that shocking day when she lost her best friend, Candice Wentworth, in an upscale oyster bar. No, Candice had not disappeared. She had died when the club’s suspended dance floor gave way, a sudden and seemingly random tragedy, casting 500+ dancers to their deaths in a 30-foot drop.
Her life ignobly snuffed out at the young age of 32, Candice exemplified a fun-loving lifestyle and a warm kindred spirit—possessing all the requisite traits for a promising future. She never entertained a trace of ill will toward anyone. How could something so grisly happen to such a compassionate, enchanting human being?
Julie struggles to make sense of it all, reminiscing as she travels back to her hometown of Trenton, New Jersey. The two had met in Milwaukee and worked as underwriters for The Walden Company. But something went horribly wrong. Julie’s journey is one filled with elation and fear, jealousy and regret, happiness and indignation, and a horrifying act of disloyalty.
An unforgettable, tumultuous ride, Last of the Autumn Rain delivers an introspective and jaw-clenching tale, which not only rocks one’s moral compass, but invites a chilling in a world where the ground can literally fall out from under you, what else might be lurking beneath the surface?
"...this novel is an excellent read for fans of psychological thrillers." — Readers' Favorite
"...For psychological thriller enthusiasts craving a riveting unsettling experience, this novel burrows under the skin and truly delivers a mind-blowing page-turner." — Ghassan Salti
AWARD-WINNING AUTHOR
"An engrossing tale of an uncanny and sometimes frightening life." — Kirkus Reviews
It was Friday night, September 2, 1983. Julie Cromwell will never forget that shocking day when she lost her best friend, Candice Wentworth, in an upscale oyster bar. No, Candice had not disappeared. She had died when the club’s suspended dance floor gave way, a sudden and seemingly random tragedy, casting 500+ dancers to their deaths in a 30-foot drop.
Her life ignobly snuffed out at the young age of 32, Candice exemplified a fun-loving lifestyle and a warm kindred spirit—possessing all the requisite traits for a promising future. She never entertained a trace of ill will toward anyone. How could something so grisly happen to such a compassionate, enchanting human being?
Julie struggles to make sense of it all, reminiscing as she travels back to her hometown of Trenton, New Jersey. The two had met in Milwaukee and worked as underwriters for The Walden Company. But something went horribly wrong. Julie’s journey is one filled with elation and fear, jealousy and regret, happiness and indignation, and a horrifying act of disloyalty.
An unforgettable, tumultuous ride, Last of the Autumn Rain delivers an introspective and jaw-clenching tale, which not only rocks one’s moral compass, but invites a chilling in a world where the ground can literally fall out from under you, what else might be lurking beneath the surface?
"...this novel is an excellent read for fans of psychological thrillers." — Readers' Favorite
"...For psychological thriller enthusiasts craving a riveting unsettling experience, this novel burrows under the skin and truly delivers a mind-blowing page-turner." — Ghassan Salti
228 pages, Paperback
Published August 4, 2025
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19 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
October 7, 2025
Diana Louise Webb has created a character who, at first, seems genteel and sympathetic (the daughter of medical professionals, as she likes to frequently remind us) but as you continue to read, you learn that Julie Cromwell is actually a psychopath. In the tradition of the Dexter books, Last of the Autumn Rain catches you by surprise when Julie commits her first murder (I had to re-read that section three times to believe my eyes!) and then continues the surprises as you ride with her through different locations and friends, who one by one, meet their ends. This is a fun read and I hope to read more stories about Julie Cromwell in the. future. Well done, Ms. Webb, great story-telling.
September 18, 2025
Diana Louise Webb delivers an A Plus on point book! it has Twists and Chills and left me wanting more. I can't wait for book 2!!
August 7, 2025
Diana Louise Webb’s Last of the Autumn Rain is an emotionally charged novel that weaves together trauma, tragedy, and mental health through the voice of a haunted narrator named Julie. The story opens with a deadly accident at a nightclub that kills Julie’s best friend and spirals into a psychological journey touching on abuse, betrayal, obsession, and revenge. As Julie revisits past experiences from her childhood in New Jersey to a near-fatal spring break trip to Mexico, she reflects on the forces that shape identity, morality, and the thin line between sanity and madness. With fictionalized events that feel brutally real, Webb holds nothing back in her mission to spotlight the stigma and neglect surrounding mental health.
The writing is sharp, vivid, and unsparing. Webb’s prose can be poetic in one moment and violently raw in the next. Her scenes of abuse and trauma are gut-wrenching without being gratuitous. I often found myself re-reading lines, not just for their emotional weight but because they caught me off guard in how directly they confronted the reader. There’s a beautiful messiness in the storytelling. Fractured timelines, flashbacks, inner monologues, and haunting hallucinations that all blend into Julie’s spiraling mental state. At times, the chaos felt overwhelming, but it always felt deliberate. It's like the author doesn’t want you to read this passively, she wants you to feel every drop of blood, guilt, and silence.
I found myself torn over the narrator. Julie is not a reliable or particularly likable character. She is violent, self-serving, and damaged. But that’s kind of the point. I couldn’t shake the feeling that Webb was daring me to judge her. One moment, Julie is saving someone from abuse; the next, she’s casually describing a childhood act of horror with a twisted sense of pride. I didn’t always agree with the choices she made. The novel sometimes seemed to blur the line between victim and perpetrator, and I admired Webb’s courage in forcing us to sit with those contradictions. It’s rare to see a female protagonist written with this much moral ambiguity and rage. And it’s even rarer for a book to make me feel that conflicted and still want to keep reading.
Last of the Autumn Rain is not a light or easy read. It’s intense, messy, and emotionally exhausting, but in the best way. This book is for readers who crave raw truth over tidy resolution. It’s for those who have battled demons or known someone who has. I would especially recommend it to fans of Gillian Flynn or Alice Sebold, readers who don’t mind going into the darker corners of the human mind. Webb has something important to say about pain, silence, and survival, and she says it with brutal, unforgettable honesty.
The writing is sharp, vivid, and unsparing. Webb’s prose can be poetic in one moment and violently raw in the next. Her scenes of abuse and trauma are gut-wrenching without being gratuitous. I often found myself re-reading lines, not just for their emotional weight but because they caught me off guard in how directly they confronted the reader. There’s a beautiful messiness in the storytelling. Fractured timelines, flashbacks, inner monologues, and haunting hallucinations that all blend into Julie’s spiraling mental state. At times, the chaos felt overwhelming, but it always felt deliberate. It's like the author doesn’t want you to read this passively, she wants you to feel every drop of blood, guilt, and silence.
I found myself torn over the narrator. Julie is not a reliable or particularly likable character. She is violent, self-serving, and damaged. But that’s kind of the point. I couldn’t shake the feeling that Webb was daring me to judge her. One moment, Julie is saving someone from abuse; the next, she’s casually describing a childhood act of horror with a twisted sense of pride. I didn’t always agree with the choices she made. The novel sometimes seemed to blur the line between victim and perpetrator, and I admired Webb’s courage in forcing us to sit with those contradictions. It’s rare to see a female protagonist written with this much moral ambiguity and rage. And it’s even rarer for a book to make me feel that conflicted and still want to keep reading.
Last of the Autumn Rain is not a light or easy read. It’s intense, messy, and emotionally exhausting, but in the best way. This book is for readers who crave raw truth over tidy resolution. It’s for those who have battled demons or known someone who has. I would especially recommend it to fans of Gillian Flynn or Alice Sebold, readers who don’t mind going into the darker corners of the human mind. Webb has something important to say about pain, silence, and survival, and she says it with brutal, unforgettable honesty.
November 13, 2025
Julie Cromwell will never forget the horrific night she lost her best friend, Candice. September 2, 1983—the vibe was electric and upbeat. Firecracker, Candice in a boozy trance, swayed her hips seductively as the music at the Oyster Bar pulsed. But it all went horribly wrong when the pendulous dance floor collapsed, sending hundreds of nightclubbers plummeting to their deaths.
Reeling in grief, Julie knows she cannot stay in Milwaukee—there are too many memories. She had a great job at Waldon, where she and Candice worked as underwriters. Still, a magnetic force (maybe sadness) was pulling Julie back to her hometown in New Jersey. The journey home is filled with car trouble and childhood flashbacks—things Julie kept locked up in a proverbial vault. But she’s feeling reminiscent, and once Julie allows one memory to slip out, she can’t contain the rest.
The closer Julie gets to New Jersey, the more unraveled she becomes. While she mourns her best friend, readers realize not everything is as it seems, as Julie harbors a dark secret rife with disloyalty.
Last of the Autumn Rain, the first book in the Broken Reflections series by Diana Louise Webb, is a propulsive psychological thriller that gives you an uneasy feeling the moment you pick it up. Alternating between past and present, readers will notice patterns between the main character’s childhood relationships and her somewhat turbulent relationship with Candice. The novel explores themes of friendship, jealousy, and mental illness, which can be a terrifying trio combined.
Webb has crafted a protagonist who left me feeling conflicted. Julie Cromwell is one of a kind. While she is clever and engaging, something about Julie seems off-kilter. Maybe it is her upbringing, being raised by two emotionally unavailable parents, or something else that one can’t quite put their finger on. Either way, Julie is a complex character, intriguing to get to know. Every page seems to peel back another layer of her personality, revealing the insidious truth. Beyond Julie, we get to know a few friends from her childhood, Mandy Jo and Billy, as well as Candice. All of whom seem to have a penchant for trouble and use Julie for personal gain. The author has done an excellent job of creating unconventional characters you’ll love to hate.
Last of the Autumn Rain by Diana Louise Webb is a quick but intense novel that will evoke a flurry of emotions. Readers will constantly question Julie’s motives and reliability as a narrator, which makes the plot even more intriguing. Moreover, the author highlights the power of perception and how untreated mental illness can have devastating consequences—provocative from beginning to end!
Reeling in grief, Julie knows she cannot stay in Milwaukee—there are too many memories. She had a great job at Waldon, where she and Candice worked as underwriters. Still, a magnetic force (maybe sadness) was pulling Julie back to her hometown in New Jersey. The journey home is filled with car trouble and childhood flashbacks—things Julie kept locked up in a proverbial vault. But she’s feeling reminiscent, and once Julie allows one memory to slip out, she can’t contain the rest.
The closer Julie gets to New Jersey, the more unraveled she becomes. While she mourns her best friend, readers realize not everything is as it seems, as Julie harbors a dark secret rife with disloyalty.
Last of the Autumn Rain, the first book in the Broken Reflections series by Diana Louise Webb, is a propulsive psychological thriller that gives you an uneasy feeling the moment you pick it up. Alternating between past and present, readers will notice patterns between the main character’s childhood relationships and her somewhat turbulent relationship with Candice. The novel explores themes of friendship, jealousy, and mental illness, which can be a terrifying trio combined.
Webb has crafted a protagonist who left me feeling conflicted. Julie Cromwell is one of a kind. While she is clever and engaging, something about Julie seems off-kilter. Maybe it is her upbringing, being raised by two emotionally unavailable parents, or something else that one can’t quite put their finger on. Either way, Julie is a complex character, intriguing to get to know. Every page seems to peel back another layer of her personality, revealing the insidious truth. Beyond Julie, we get to know a few friends from her childhood, Mandy Jo and Billy, as well as Candice. All of whom seem to have a penchant for trouble and use Julie for personal gain. The author has done an excellent job of creating unconventional characters you’ll love to hate.
Last of the Autumn Rain by Diana Louise Webb is a quick but intense novel that will evoke a flurry of emotions. Readers will constantly question Julie’s motives and reliability as a narrator, which makes the plot even more intriguing. Moreover, the author highlights the power of perception and how untreated mental illness can have devastating consequences—provocative from beginning to end!
January 15, 2026
From the opening pages, Julie Cromwell is thrust into a world defined by tragedy and emotional wreckage. That darkness deepens dramatically when her best friend Candice dies in a horrifying nightclub collapse, where hundreds of people plunge through a shattered dance floor. This singular, shocking event fractures Julie’s sense of reality and becomes the catalyst for everything that follows.
Julie’s internal struggle is not only about grief, but about understanding herself and the forces consuming her mind. The novel powerfully highlights the fragility of memory and the lingering grip of inner demons. Trauma twists thought patterns into a maze, distorting perception and reshaping how Julie interacts with the world, and with those closest to her, in ways that are not always visible on the surface.
Webb’s prose is razor-sharp and unflinching. One moment it’s lyrical and poetic; the next, disturbingly raw. Flashbacks of childhood trauma and fractured friendships bleed into betrayals and vivid hallucinations, blurring the line between reality and delusion. The reader is never allowed to remain passive, this book demands emotional engagement, forcing you to feel the sting of paranoia and the ache of psychological collapse as if you’re witnessing Julie’s fractured mind first hand.
Julie is not a conventional heroine, and that is precisely the point. She is unreliable, volatile, and deeply unsettling. One moment she is protective and vulnerable; the next, she recounts past horrors with an eerie, chilling calm. That contradiction is both fascinating and disturbing, making her a character you may not always sympathize with, but one you will never forget.
Julie’s internal struggle is not only about grief, but about understanding herself and the forces consuming her mind. The novel powerfully highlights the fragility of memory and the lingering grip of inner demons. Trauma twists thought patterns into a maze, distorting perception and reshaping how Julie interacts with the world, and with those closest to her, in ways that are not always visible on the surface.
Webb’s prose is razor-sharp and unflinching. One moment it’s lyrical and poetic; the next, disturbingly raw. Flashbacks of childhood trauma and fractured friendships bleed into betrayals and vivid hallucinations, blurring the line between reality and delusion. The reader is never allowed to remain passive, this book demands emotional engagement, forcing you to feel the sting of paranoia and the ache of psychological collapse as if you’re witnessing Julie’s fractured mind first hand.
Julie is not a conventional heroine, and that is precisely the point. She is unreliable, volatile, and deeply unsettling. One moment she is protective and vulnerable; the next, she recounts past horrors with an eerie, chilling calm. That contradiction is both fascinating and disturbing, making her a character you may not always sympathize with, but one you will never forget.
October 30, 2025
Beginning with the tragic death of so many in a freak nightclub incident, author Diana Louise Webb slowly slots the puzzle pieces of Julie’s life together. As readers get a sense of the woman who witnessed her friend die that tragic night, what begins to unravel shocks us all.
Webb paints the life of an ordinary child, a portrait so vivid. Growing up in Trenton, New Jersey, Julie now finds herself in the throes of her career as she’s settled in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. “Last of the Autumn Rain” captures the nuances of female friendships as Julie’s life from childhood to adulthood is broken into the friendships and experiences she’s inhabited throughout. From Mexico to Spain, Italy and back, these experiences shed a new light on Julie and her friendships. As her past comes into focus, her present and future slowly appear through a new lens.
Suddenly, leaving her life in Wisconsin behind, Julie’s world is shattered into the before and after of the loss of her dear friend Candice, in that nightclub accident. Webb creates a layered read as friendship, desire, and deceit lurk below the surface. In this twisting tale, “Last of the Autumn Rain” adventures through Candice and Julie’s friendship as Webb slowly peels back the dynamic between these two women.
Readers will leave this book feeling like they have only just scratched the surface of Julie Monroe Cromwell. As she embarks on this next journey, we are left wondering who will become Julie’s next friend and where her new life will take her.
Webb paints the life of an ordinary child, a portrait so vivid. Growing up in Trenton, New Jersey, Julie now finds herself in the throes of her career as she’s settled in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. “Last of the Autumn Rain” captures the nuances of female friendships as Julie’s life from childhood to adulthood is broken into the friendships and experiences she’s inhabited throughout. From Mexico to Spain, Italy and back, these experiences shed a new light on Julie and her friendships. As her past comes into focus, her present and future slowly appear through a new lens.
Suddenly, leaving her life in Wisconsin behind, Julie’s world is shattered into the before and after of the loss of her dear friend Candice, in that nightclub accident. Webb creates a layered read as friendship, desire, and deceit lurk below the surface. In this twisting tale, “Last of the Autumn Rain” adventures through Candice and Julie’s friendship as Webb slowly peels back the dynamic between these two women.
Readers will leave this book feeling like they have only just scratched the surface of Julie Monroe Cromwell. As she embarks on this next journey, we are left wondering who will become Julie’s next friend and where her new life will take her.
November 24, 2025
Last of the Autumn Rain is the first book from the Broken Reflections series. It is, also, my first experience with the talents of author Diana Louise Webb I thought it was a pretty good book. It was full of action, suspense and mystery. There were plenty of twists that kept me intrigued until the very end. I enjoyed taking this adventure with Julie.
I am going to give Last of the Autumn Rain four and a half stars. I believe readers who enjoy reading thrillers. I am interested in getting my hands on the next installment from the Broken Reflections series to see where else Diana Louise Webb will take her fans to next.
I received a paperback copy of Diana Louise Webb's Last of the Autumn Rain (Broken Reflections) from the publisher, but was not required to write a positive review. This review is one hundred percent my own honest opinion.
I am going to give Last of the Autumn Rain four and a half stars. I believe readers who enjoy reading thrillers. I am interested in getting my hands on the next installment from the Broken Reflections series to see where else Diana Louise Webb will take her fans to next.
I received a paperback copy of Diana Louise Webb's Last of the Autumn Rain (Broken Reflections) from the publisher, but was not required to write a positive review. This review is one hundred percent my own honest opinion.
September 3, 2025
Marketed as a psychological thriller, the twists of the complex storyline kept me guessing til the end. The novel is written with deep--almost poetic--descriptions, and many of the characters are flawed and intriguing. If you enjoy a book that keeps you turning the pages, this is a quick-paced tale that will give you pause.
October 21, 2025
Prepare to be utterly blindsided—this book doesn't just offer twists and turns, it delivers blunt-force revelations that will keep you gasping until the very last page. An absolute eye-opener and a modern classic in the making. This novel is a white-knuckle ride through the human psyche, brilliantly dissecting how a monstrous ego can fracture a life into a thousand isolated pieces.
October 7, 2025
I tried to like this book, but I contemplated just giving up several times. The book is all over the place, and really hard to follow what is happening. There are some surprising twists and turns, which is why I rated it three stars.
December 21, 2025
This thriller is off the charts! The plot twists had me guessing till the very end. Authours's writing is masterful!
December 23, 2025
Fantastic read
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews