Last Chance Books

by Kelsey Rodkey

Don’t you just love the smell of old books in the morning?

Madeline Moore does. Books & Moore, the musty bookstore her family has owned for generations, is where she feels most herself. Nothing is going to stop her from coming back after college to take over the store from her beloved aunt.

Nothing, that is—until a chain bookstore called Prologue opens across the street and threatens to shut them down.

Madeline sets out to demolish the competition, but Jasper, the guy who works over at Prologue, seems intent on ruining her life. Not only is he taking her customers, he has the unbelievable audacity to be… extremely cute.

But that doesn’t matter. Jasper is the enemy and he will be destroyed. After all—all’s fair in love and (book) wars.

Genres: Romance, Young Adult, Contemporary, Enemies To Lovers, Audiobook, Books About Books, Contemporary Romance

368 pages, ebook

First published May 18, 2021

About the author

Kelsey Rodkey is the author of the young adult novels Last Chance Books, A Disaster in Three Acts, Plus One, and Class Act. She is a banter enthusiast always in search of scary movies, delicious carbs, and her next five-star read. She once helped a British film crew make a documentary about creative dog grooming and has a terrible fear of waterslides. She lives in Pennsylvania with her partner and their cats, Cheese and Tux.

Reviews

[menna]

did someone say EMPLOYEES OF RIVAL BOOKSTORES?👀

[aly ☆彡 (on vacation) · Rating 2 out of 5]

"Like getting a paper cut followed by a million paper cuts, just when the first one had stopped hurting. And yet, she keeps picking up the paper"

I just have to apologize for what I have to write but if I have to summarize the whole book, I'll just say it is: the book of people with issues

The first problem I already have with this book is that:it's plotless. Like it's trying to be there but it's barely there, by having an only difficult and childish character as its focus.

1. Madeline
I see where she is coming from, having a mother who abandons her, a stepbrother who may or may not rub you on the face for having a father you don't. It almost felt justified to whatever reactions or feelings she had given the situation. But it's not. I wanted to understand Madeline so bad but somehow her personality made it easier for readers to focus on her bad sides instead of the good ones. Madeline is childish, self-centred and dramatic.

The book store she worked at from a family business, is almost like a family member to her. Knowing she had to lose them over a rival book store just doesn't sit right with her. She has to fight for it and that is understandable. What not is her way of daunting everyone around her just because things don't go her way.

Not to say her abandonment issue thanks to her mother, she can't help but build a wall for her romantic relationship just so she won't get hurt if they happened to leave her as her mother used to. Which then leads to stupid assumptions that are usually 1) not true 2) presumptuous 3) get around to unnecessary drama.

2. Romance
Meanwhile, Jasper is not as bad as he seems. He just happened to fall in love at first sight (I guess) which was rather insta-love given the lack of establishment for the couple, with no sense of emotional connection. He saw her passed by, he likes her, he tried to woo her but with a wrong move, promptly, starting fuel between the two with their childish and stupid pranks leaving me baffled at how the story goes.

The dynamic between the love interests was poorly executed that I couldn't find myself to simply enjoy their romance. It has some nice and heartwarming moments but just the overall premise doesn't seem to work out between the two.

3. Mother-daughter conflict

“She’s a window shopper and we’re the books inside. Well, I don’t know about Astrid, but I’m tired of discounting myself in hopes that Dahlia will finally want to buy me.”

Madeline may seem like she hates her mother for always ended up leaving and choosing her career over Madeline. When in truth, all she only wants was to have her mother close and care for her.

Therefore, you can definitely feel her hostility when Dahlia decided to stay for good. Although the resolution was almost nicely done, I honestly don't see how those two managed to resolve their conflicts with those abandonment & commitment issues these two seem to have respectively. The books barely showed how Madeline and Dahlia tried to clear the bad blood between them seeing how little time they have with each other in the book. Like... this was part of the conflict but it wasn't tackled good enough for readers to be remotely touched by the time they reconciled.

All in all, I just don't find anything I could enjoy with this book. It could have been better sure, but the characters weren’t a big help. A miserly me wants to give this book a star rating. Reading this feels pointless and giving it two stars rating is generous enough. I have no expectations for this book at all but it still manages to disappoint me somehow ((´д｀))

[Kelsey Rodkey · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you like this book, check out A DISASTER IN THREE ACTS: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5...

CONTENT WARNINGS FOR LAST CHANCE BOOKS:

-child abandonment by deadbeat parent
-gentrification
-blood/injury related to car accident
-alcohol/underage drinking
-internalized and challenged fatphobia

I may have missed some, so I apologize in advance.

[Lia Carstairs]

DNF @ pg 45

I give up on this book💀
The main character irritates me to no end and I'm barely into the book. Also, the supposed "love interest" ahaha he already gives off bad vibes and I know I'm going to hate him too so um yeah not putting myself through any more torture🤚 especially when I'm already in a terrible 3 month long slump


Thank you Harper Collins Canada for sending me an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

[ava !! · Rating 1 out of 5]

if you think this book is a light hearted, cute and fun, enemies to lovers YA about book-loving book store employees, you’re wrong.
the description of the book is battling bookstores across the street from one another with an enemies to lovers romance plot line, like doesn’t that sound great ???
but here’s the thing, did the book even coincide with that description ?? not even slightly.
it took me over a month to read this book which is an excruciatingly long time for me to read a book. at times I would think “am I in a reading slump? or is this book putting me in a reading slump?” and I am almost entirely sure it was the books fault.

there is just so much I did not really enjoy about this book
and here are a few complaints of mine:

1. madeline herself. (aka the main character/pov of the book) madeline is extremely annoying, immature, and selfish. throughout the book she belittles everyone else’s problems, acting as if her problems are the biggest and everyone should care about hers and only hers. she lacks communication with everyone, and I mean everyone. she would randomly just be mad at like her family members or jasper, but the problem would most certainly be solved if only she spoke her thoughts instead of throwing a literal tantrum. her character just gave me a lot of “icks” throughout the book, an example being she literally blamed benny (her brother) for having a dad present in his life just because she doesn’t like ???? overall, really did not enjoy her character…. like at all.
(spoilers! I just want to add this one spoiler because it physically IRKED me, the fact that madeline got so mad at jasper after literally snooping around HIS room after they got done making out for pranking her by cancelling her book shipment order for the pop up event for her bookstore (and was revealed that the prank was before they were a “thing” and were still pranking each other might I add) when she literally got him hit by a car and sent to the hospital from her prank LIKE EXCUSE ME WHAT ??? end of spoilers!)
2. the romance. let’s just say there is really no enemies to lovers in this book, I think it should be labeled more as insta-love. the romance started quite abruptly randomly halfway through the book with the two romantic interests having interacted with one another like a total of only 5 times just for jasper (male love interest) to confess that he’s liked her for months ??? there was no buildup, in fact it kind of was like a punch to the face instead. there is probably a total of 30-40 pages or less of actual “romance” out of a total of 352 pages for this whole book. I was in fact neither giggling or kicking my feet in this one which is quite disappointing.
3. the plot. like I said earlier, this book does not follow what the cover sleeve says at all. sure jasper and madeline played a few pranks on each other to “sabotage” each others book stores but that was not the main focus of the book. it really followed madeline and her family issues, I’d say like over half of the book is her with her family and her getting angry at them rather than her getting back and sabotaging the “rival bookstore.” just the plot line was not enjoyable for me and was not really what I was expecting which was just more so a let down rather than a complaint.
4. the writing. I called madeline immature and I’d say it’s because the author wrote her to be quite immature. yes madeline is a senior in high school so like more “youthful” writing is it be expected, but at times it was so immature and cringe I couldn’t physically take it. there was also constant talk of alcohol, sexual activity, and high profanity it just got old quick. I just felt like the author might of over killed it with trying to make the book like “relatable” for the audience being targeted towards teens ??? along with the writing, the author was wayyyy too descriptive with small things just like her holding a stack of books or turning her key in her car, like the author would make madeline turn her car key for a full paragraph which just was so unnecessary for me. there were just too many times of just completey pointless descriptive writing about doing the simplest tasks, it dragged on way too much.

to not sound like I hated this book here are some things I enjoyed:

1. the cover !! super cute cover with the little drawing on the front and the color scheme is really pleasing to the eye, so I really enjoy that. also I like how jasper is standing on like pristine new books while madeline is standing on worn old books, the both of them representing their own stores so that’s pretty cool :0.
2. that the book ended !! :D (this is by all means a joke (partially), but do not take this seriously lol)

I won’t rate it a 1/5 stars because I feel like that means I couldn’t stand the book at all, but this book was in fact slightly bearable. I’d give it a solid 2/5 stars (would be rated a 1.5 in all honesty but I’m giving it a bonus 0.5 because I like the cover LOL)

edit: after going back and reading this review, I’m going to rate this book a 1/5, cause funny story, I actually hated this.

[Grace (irisroman & evajacks' version) ✧ · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was really fun!! 💗💗 A very light, entertaining read 🥰🥰

RTC!

[Sabi · Rating 1 out of 5]

The best thing about the book? The cover.


The Premise was nice but the execution is all wrong.

The weakest aspect of the book was the characters. They all are very bland and boring, especially the leads.

It is not at all enemies to lovers, more like insta romance.

The voiceover of the audiobook is also not decent. The side character's voices are not at all good to listen to, especially the male leads'. It feels like he is yawning all the time and just wants to sleep.

[ß · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5

unlike all the other ppl giving this such a low rating, i kno how to have fun

[Libby · Rating 1 out of 5]

Look, I really wanted to like this book. A meet-cute in a used-books shop? A dream. Rivals to lovers fighting to keep their stores in business? Sign me up. Sure to be full of flirty banter and literary references? I’m in.
Unfortunately, this book fell short on nearly every front. There were a few moments that were cute in a rom-com way but on the whole this book left me thoroughly disappointed for numerous reasons, mainly because it had the potential to be a great adult fiction book with some changes.

WARNING: long review with spoilers ahead

TL;DR: main character is self-absorbed, petty, and shows no growth; love interest is under-developed; plot is haphazard and it reads like a fanfiction or a short story attempted to stretch into a novel

1. Madeline
Throughout the entirety of the book, Madeline is petty, self-centered, and demanding of everyone around her. I’m not against a selfish main character, but usually in those cases there comes a reckoning for them in the latter half of the book which ultimately leads to character development. There is no development for Madeline. One could argue that her development comes in the form of how she reacts to the store closing at the end, but that still leaves much to be desired. I kept waiting for Zelda to pull the best-friend tough love on her and tell Madeline how selfish and rude she was being to everyone who cared about her, but it never came. In fact, the whole book felt like you were supposed to believe Madeline was fully in the right and justified about everything she does.

While the storylines of the store being like a member of the family to her, and her trust issues regarding her mother flitting in and out of her life were powerful and you could justify some of her actions, she ultimately was so self-absorbed it was very difficult to root for her. She also blamed everyone else around her for anything that went wrong, and was so overdramatic in her climactic fight with Jasper, especially since he forgave her instantly for everything.

ALSO, the whole point of her crusade is she wants to take over the bookstore after graduation, but she never has a real conversation with her aunt about that, she just expects to get what she wants without talking about it or asking for it. In general, she is just an annoying character with very little development

2. Jasper
Oh, Jasper. It’s not you, it’s how you’re written. To put it bluntly, Jasper sounds like a 14 year old’s description of a perfect boyfriend. He’s drop dead gorgeous, smart, designs cosplay costumes, and falls head over heels in love with Madeline at first sight. And oh, she has to be careful with him, as she’s warned by his best friend, because he's so obsessed with her and he falls too hard too fast and he’ll get his heart broken.

The problem with Jasper is that there is none. He has no flaws, because he isn’t developed enough to have them. He’s a two-dimensional character that only exists to be a love interest for Madeline. And when the book is supposed to be a YA romance, it’s tough when half of that romance has the character depth of a puddle.

There’s no conflict with Jasper. I think this is partly because the book is Madeline’s POV, and it would have helped to have Jasper’s as well, but he also just has nothing going on outside of Madeline. There is a slight storyline of him wanting to go to design school but not telling his family, but that gets wrapped up neatly in a bow when he tells them and they’re totally supportive. I would have loved an actual backstory or arc for Jasper that’s not just trying to woo Madeline, maybe real conflict with his family not supporting his dream, or trying to live up to their expectations and feeling like he can’t.

Much like Madeline, Jasper also had no character development throughout the book, but that’s because there wasn’t any character to begin with.

3. The Plot
My main issue with the plot is that there isn’t one. It feels like a short story that they attempted to stretch into a novel, but there isn’t enough substance for that. There’s a loose thread of “Madeline is trying to save her family’s store from closing and is in a rivalry with the store across the street” but the enemies to lovers plot is pretty much abandoned halfway through the book when she gets together with Jasper. For most of the book there just isn’t a substantive story and it doesn’t work as a full length novel.

As far as the ending, It was just so frustrating to me that everyone is apologizing and siding with Madeline, especially Jasper’s family. It made me so mad at the end when his whole family came over to replace the books and were fawning over Madeline, telling her she was completely in the right and Jasper had no business doing that to her store and please forgive them. Like, this girl was actively trying to sabotage your business and GOT YOUR SON HIT BY A CAR, why are you acting like she’s a saint? It just didn’t make sense.

Additionally, the ending with the store closing just felt hollow. Like, then what was the point of the whole story? She’s still on the exact same path as she was in the beginning, all that’s different is she has a boyfriend now. And she’s suddenly fine with the store closing because she’s learned what? To live in the moment? It just doesn’t resonate or feel like a proper ending for the character.

This brings me to my biggest issue with the book, and it’s that it should have been an Adult/New Adult romance. Having Madeline try to save the store before she goes off to college is a miss because the stakes aren’t very high for her. Even if the store is saved, she’s going off to college. If the store fails, she still goes to college, she just might get a different degree? She acts like it will derail her future but she’d still be on the same path. I get the idea of her trying to hold on to this piece of her family, but to me that isn’t enough to go on as her main motivation. If instead she was 22-23, just graduated college, came back to take over the bookstore, and then found out the competition was driving her out of business, that would have made for a much more compelling story. Not only would she be trying to save her family’s store and hold on to this place that means so much to her, her job and her future actually would be at stake. Plus it would resonate with so many more people if she spent four years at college working towards this and now she feels like it’s slipping away and she’s failing. You would want to root for her to keep her store in business because you would be able to recognize the stakes and the pressure that she feels. With her being a teenager trying to save a store she’s going to leave at the end of summer anyway, she just comes off as petty and whiny.

4. The Writing
I won't lie, I cringed at a lot of this. I know it’s a YA and the characters are in their late teens, but there were several moments where it felt like they were 13. There were moments when the characters acted far younger than they actually are, and then there are attempts to contradict this and remind readers they are older by throwing in lines about sex, drinking, and masturbation, which just makes for a confusing read. (Another reason why this should be an adult novel, the blatant and frequent mentions of how badly Madeline wants to bang Jasper and the sex scene that came out of nowhere).

I expected a lot of banter and flirting, classic in an enemies or rivals to lovers book, but again it fell flat. They have a couple cute back-and-forths but far less than I was expecting. A lot of the dialogue just doesn’t make sense for two teenagers. It’s either “no 19 year old would ever say this” or “no human being would ever say this”. Now, there’s always some leeway in dialogue for me, but some of it is just so unrealistic it pulls you right out of the story. There are also so few literary references for a romance set in rival bookstores, it's criminal. The only references are to a fake dystopian series.

I actually really liked the side characters. Zelda, Benny, Grant, Ravi, Luke were all interesting but the problem was there was nothing about them. All we got were throwaway lines like Zelda’s father being in rehab and Luke thinking Jasper doesn’t have any drive that weren’t addressed again in any meaningful way. I guess since the book is Madeline’s POV and she’s so thoroughly self-centered she doesn’t pay attention to anyone else?

All things considered, this book was a tough read. I think it had the potential to be a great Adult/New Adult Romance with some tweaks, but it just doesn’t work as is. If you are looking for a YA romance, I would not recommend it.

[Dawn Solaris · Rating 1 out of 5]

★彡 1.25 stars 彡★

⭑𓂃 ᗰOᖇᗩᒪ Oᖴ TᕼE ᔕTOᖇY: 🄳🄾🄽’🅃 🄹🅄🄳🄶🄴 🄰 🄱🄾🄾🄺 🄱🅈 🄸🅃🅂 🄲🄾🅅🄴🅁

Me love being polite 凸( •̀_•́ )凸

[Amélie Boucher · Rating 3 out of 5]

This wasn't bad, but not what I was expecting.

My biggest issue with this book is how petty the main character is. The whole enemies-to-lovers thing is pretty one-sided because she's the only one seeing a threat in the new bookstore across the street (I mean even her family doesn't care, and it's a family-run bookstore). The only reason the love interest plays along with her little prank war is because he's so obviously into her. So in the end, it was hard for me to root for the main character.

I really enjoyed the romance, but it didn't take up enough space in my opinion. I wanted more pining and angst, but instead I got some awkward moments and a few hot and heavy scenes.

In the end, the plot was fun and made me laugh, but the main character was pretty unbearable and made it hard for me to connect with it the way I wanted to. There was also some questionable plus-size rep?

[emmy · Rating 3 out of 5]

ˋ°•*⁀➷ last chance books by kelsey rodkey

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆┆3 day read ┆romance genre ┆y/a

- I see LOADS of hate reviews on this book so i want to be among the others hyping up this book!! honestly I can't say it was amazing but I LOVED the cozy bookstore aesthetic/feel of it.
╰┈➤ while reading this after a long slump, i can definitely say that the light and fluffy feel really made the book more fast-paced and easy to read!! <33

˚˖𓍢ִ໋🌷͙֒✧˚⋆

likes: THE COVER!!!!, the cozy aesthetic, the bookstore occupation, some of the characters, the ending, the fast-paced feel.

dislikes: most of the characters, the miscommunication trope, most of the modern-day references.

---

✎ characters..

madeline ✮ fmc - IDK WHY but madeline kinda like mostly made me frustrated.. i feel like she took the business prank war thing way too far. i don't have much to say about her but her character wasn't my favourite, although i did appreciate how much she cared for the store + books in general.

jasper ✮ mmc - PLS NO!!! i didn't really like him at all, ESPECIALLY around the beginning/middle of the book. i mean like the very ending i guess he was fine but around the whole book he was sooooo frustrating. he's honestly way more infuriating than madeline. changing up the new covers book order also went too far.

zelda ✮ fmc best friend - YESS zelda COOKED and SERVED in this book she was BY FAR my favourite and one of the only sufferable characters. she seems like an amazing friend tbh and i love how she thrifts vintage band t-shirts. she's just the best character of all!

benny ✮ fmc brother - he was around the infuriating line but almost just made it. WHY did he keep ditching madeline to stay with dahlia all the time. like bestie she was probably going to only talk to madeline anyways???? he didn't have any complete faults other than WORKING WITH THE ENEMY and getting mad at madeline for reacting personally, so he doesn't really make it into the least favourite characters category.

astrid ✮ fmc guardian - OMG i loved astrid she was an amazing guardian mom and YES i will call her madeline's mom because dahlia the disappearing isn't here to get mad at me !! astrid was at like no faults that i can remember, and along with her being a great character that makes an AMAZING character!!

୭ ˚.⁺⊹ .ᐟ

playlist!! ↴

- mess it up by gracie abrams
- things i wish you said by sabrina carpenter
- love is embarrassing by olivia rodrigo
- right where you left me by taylor swift
- i think he knows by taylor swift

⋆ ˚｡ ⋆୨♡୧⋆ ˚｡ ⋆ ⋆ ˚｡ ⋆୨♡୧⋆ ˚｡ ⋆ ⋆ ˚｡ ⋆୨♡୧⋆ ˚｡ ⋆

꒰ 🧁 - ᝰ.ᐟ ꒱ pre-read: i am SOSOSOSOSOSOSO excited to start reading this!! i only bought it because of the cover this is one of the cutest covers i’ve ever seen!!! after being in a very long slump i’m hoping a light and fluffy book into the reappearance of rachel price will really be a pick-me-up! <3

[Emily Michelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

the main character has a serious attitude problem 😭 justice for Jasper he deserved better than her

[Rachel Solomon · Rating 5 out of 5]

THE BEST BOOK BY THE BEST PERSON

[Samantha ♡ ( Percy’s Version ) · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5/5⭐️
I haven’t finished a book this fast in a while. I flew through this book. I personally don’t get how people dislike this book so much. It was a quick little read, I get how the main character could get a little annoying at times but for me it wasn’t that bad. I liked how the two main characters were employees of rival bookstores. I liked that they sabotaged each others bookstores. I loved the banter in this book.
But for a romance book there was very little romance. I get that the whole saving the bookstore thing was the plot but it’s a romance book. You gotta give me something to work with. I just wished there was more romance other that a couple pages here or there throughout the book.

[Laura ☾ · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm usually a sucker for a bookish romance, but really just couldn't stand either of the protagonists in this..

Honestly Madeline kind of acted like a brat throughout most of it, and Jasper was just too manipulative for my liking...

[Stace · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book Reviewed on www.whisperingstories.com

In this YA romance book, we meet Madeline Moore who is at college and works at Books & Moore her family-run bookstore. She loves the place that was started by her grandmother and wants to keep it in the family. However, the book shop is in trouble, the rent has been increased and the business isn’t doing as well as it used to. With that in mind, her aunt wants to close it when their lease is up in three months.

Madeline blames the new chain bookstore, Prologue, which has opened up across the street supervised by the owner’s son, Jasper, who happens to be gorgeous, sexy, and talented, although he has started copying her selling techniques and Madeline is livid. This is war. She is determined to not let them drive Books & Moore out of business, she is also determined that she is not going to fall for Jasper either.

I love books set in bookshops, so the idea of two rival bookshops being at war with one another had me eager to read Last Chance Books. For those of you who are bookish and want to dive into the story, just a note that this is a YA book not an adult romance/enemies to lovers book, so some might find it a little young for them. For me, I love the pace of YA books and didn’t mind the young characters who often didn’t handle situations well, be warned though if you don’t like foul language as there is a lot of banter between the characters that included it.

I got through the story quickly as I found myself turning the pages at speed keeping up with all the goings-on. Madeline has a complicated life, including a mother who has been absent for most of it and so she was brought up by her aunt, however, her mother is back and once again she tells Madeline that she is here to stay this time, or until Madeline’s younger brother heads off to college in two years.

There was a decent amount of humour within the pages and I did giggle a few times out loud. With its fun plot, complex but likeable characters, and set in a location all bookworms love, this was an interesting, easy-going enjoyable read.

[Cassandra · Rating 2 out of 5]

While I love an enemies to lovers trope, I found this one to be infuriating on multiple occasions. Madeline is so impulsive and self-centred and incredibly dramatic that it makes her unbearable. I wanted to shake her pretty much the entire time.

I also just felt like the animosity between the two of them, however playful it may have been, fizzled out too soon and made them feel rushed which as a result, took away from the potential chemistry the two characters may have had. Jasper wasn't THAT likeable, and I honestly found myself more frustrated at his part in all of this as the book went on. Madeline didn't offer any other characteristic other than the fact that she lived and breathed Books and Moore. She was going to go away for school anyway so I'm not sure what she was saving if she was leaving it behind anyways. The story could've maybe had more of an impact if she'd decided not to go to school and stay back to look after the store, and then chose school for herself in the end when she came to terms with the store closing. I think it would've shown more growth in her as a character, but instead, she just chose the path that she'd originally planned on walking.

Her reaction to Benny getting a new job was kind of valid? But girl, relax. I really expected to love this because it reminded me of Tweet Cute but unfortunately, I think this one just missed its mark with me.

Thank you to Edelweiss+ and HarperCollins for the ARC in exchange for an honest review

[cossette · Rating 3 out of 5]

Trigger warnings for: absent father, child abandonment, estranged parents, brief mention of car accident (ch 11)

still thinking about how this is literally just enemies to lovers excellence & you've got mail with teens

rtc closer to publication date!!

[human · Rating 2 out of 5]

(2 stars seems too lenient... but we'll keep it there for now)

this,,, what even was this. honestly, i can't even answer that question myself and it's been like five months since i read this dumpster fire of a book.



'last chance books' promises so much of what i love, that it's actually incredibly disheartening that it delivered on almost none of it, and irritated me to no end. just from the cover, my hopes and expectations were admittedly pretty high. yes, i am the type of person who repeatedly falls for pretty cover marketing and only lives to regret it. i have nothing to say for myself.

on top of that, the synopsis promises an exciting enemies-to-lovers romance set against the backdrop of feuding bookstores. it ?? sounds ?? so ?? amazing ?? but, oh man, let me tell you, this book was just not it.

the very first thing that comes to mind when i think about this book is CRINGE. i secondhand embarrassment'd (?) my way through this audiobook and it was so incredibly painful; i feel extremely wronged by that amazingly deceptive cover that i will likely sue for false advertisement. (this is a joke. i'm a broke student. please don't take this seriously)

why was this so disturbingly cringeworthy you ask? well, for starters, it was the romance. YES, the romance of a romance novel was cringy to me. is there any hope left for the book at this point? i don't think so either. we're told it's enemies-to-lovers but in reality it's just the main character not-so secretly lusting after the love interest while saying mildly antagonistic things to his face. meanwhile, the love interest fell head over heels in love with miss mc after talking to her for all of about three times. that's not enemies-to-lovers??? all i smell here is a load of insta-love and i don't like it.



unfortunately for us, while the romance was being disappointing, the characters were being insufferable too.

the main character, whose name i can't even remember was SO. CHILDISH. and i know that it was later explained why she behaved the way she did and all of the excuses were made, but that doesn't take away from the fact that i absolutely couldn't bring myself to root for or her ill-advised decisions because of how infuriating she was, and how horribly she treated everyone around her just because of her own inner turmoil.

the love interest was just ugh. he was bland. i can't even remember anything noteworthy about him other than his interest in cosplay and fashion design or something?? which, i mean, yay, follow your dreams and all that, but also like, get a personality maybe? heard they're going for pretty cheap on ebay these days but i wouldn't know.

ON TOP OF ALL OF THIS. yes there is still more i hated about this book. I FELT LIKE THE PACING WAS WAY OFF??? not 100% sure about this seeing as to how it took me basically ten days to slog through it + time is a construct BUT it just felt off. arguably, that could be said for everything regarding that book but we're choosing to ignore that for now.



the fact that i was listening to this book while suffering through math homework probably did not help my experience of this whatsoever. regardless, i really was extremely disappointed by the way this book did not deliver on any of what i was expecting, despite all of the potential that it had with such an interesting concept.

hopefully this experience will make me less vulnerable to illustrated book covers that clearly scream "IT'S A TRAP DON'T DO IT" but i think we all know that's not going to happen :' )

[ally · Rating 5 out of 5]

ummmm why was this literally so amazing?
I spent like my whole morning in bed reading this and seriously, what's better than a book about books?! even more, enemies to lovers in bookstores?!
I love jasper so much like AHH
idk the whole aspect of this *chef's kiss*
I love how in like chapter 27, this is a line. “Friends working at rival bookstores?” Warbeck gives us an appraising look. “That would make a good story.”
fakhskjhfdjksfhsdjdshksfjhd I loved this so much, and now I can finally get ready for the day (and eat)

no seriously, read this <3

[laura]

enemies to lovers with bookstores??😍😍😍

why did i just find this😭

*PLZ don't reject me🥺🥺


━━━━━━━━━━━༻༻❁༺༺━━━━━━━━━━━

when you see "wish for it" but you never get what you wish for :(
*plays sad playlist and cries silently*

[Catalina · Rating 1 out of 5]

dnf this at 30% so by all means ignore this review
I went into this book expecting a swoon worthy retelling of You Got Mail and what I received was far less than that.
I had to stop myself from rolling my eyes every other page and don't get me started on the dialogue which was written very weird and I can't pinpoint exactly why it read weird but it was awkward.

[Alaina · Rating 3 out of 5]

Last Chance Books was a cute little bookstore rivalry thing-a-mah-jig. In it, you will meet Madeline and Jasper. Kind of got hints of a forbidden Romeo and Juliet romance since Madeline and Jasper both work at their family owned bookstores. One is failing while the other is thriving. It also doesn't hurt that they are both starting to develop feelings for the other.. which is a huge no no.

Let the bookstore wars commence!

I'm just going to admit it - I liked these two. Whether things were going to become romantic or not. They were just adorkable in every lovable way possible. The one thing I thought was super awkward was when Madeline's mom came into town. It kind of sucked that she wasn't really a mom to her for most of her life. Then all of sudden she wants to start falling into that roll because it's convenient now.

I mean it makes zero sense to me since Madeline is in college now but details! I could easily see how she treats her aunt like her own mom versus the random stranger who just showed up. I also didn't really like how upset her mom was because of this. Like, no, you don't get to play the mom card to your adult child now. You had endless opportunities to be her mom but you decided you wanted to be elsewhere.

So suck it up buttercup and sit down.

Other than that, this had some humor to it but the drama was basically here to stay. I'm also slightly jealous that their families own bookstores. Oh to be surrounded by books all day every day. What a life to live!

[kimberly ☆ · Rating 4 out of 5]

thank you so much to harperteen for this arc!

this lovely book gets a 4/5 stars from me!

this book is a breath of fresh air, i really liked the complexity of madeline’s character. it’s been a while since i’ve read a character that acknowledge her faults, and it really refreshing to see that. throughout the story you hate her and love her, there are moments that you are rooting for her and moments that you want to yell at her through the screen! then we welcome in jasper the perfect rival across the street who happens to also be very attracted to madeline & and very attractive in his own way. i feel like their relationship is very natural in the sense of its progression romantically. i really liked how that was depicted. i also very much enjoyed zelda‘s character as a whole, i feel like in the story if i was to place myself in a character i probably would be zelda so she was also nice to read about. all in all this book was a very easy nice read and i would recommend it!

[Muffinsandbooks · Rating 3 out of 5]

C'était mignon, c'était sympa d'être dans l'univers des livres, mais je pense que j'avais fixé la barre un peu haut en me typant toute seule avec le résumé (et la beauté de la couverture). C'est mignon donc, mais un peu lent et la romance m'a plu... mais sans plus quoi. Il n'empêche que j'ai passé un bon moment avec Madeline et Jasper.

[౨ৎ · Rating 1 out of 5]

i…didn’t like this. i…hated this?

[Kalena ୨୧ · Rating 2 out of 5]

2/5 stars, the main character was not my favorite

I'm really disappointed that I didn't like this book because the cover looks so cute and the synopsis sounded really interesting as well, but pretty much everything about the two main characters I disliked. This review is going to be short as I don't have much to talk about beyond how annoying they were, and how many bad vibes I got from their romance, but I will acknowledge a few things that I did enjoy a bit about this book.

For one, I picked this book up on audiobook, and while I don't think the format would have any effect on my liking of the main characters, the narrator had a pretty voice. I think it fits the voice of our main character, Madeline, very well and was pretty relaxing to listen to, other than Madeline's little moments. Because I wasn't liking it as much as I hoped, this did take me longer to read because I just kept putting off finishing it. Once I did commit to finishing it though it went by pretty fast and I think it was a short read that one could easily read in a day or two if one enjoyed it that much.

Madeline Moore. Hm. There was barely one thing that I enjoyed about her, especially when I felt she wasn't supposed to be written as an unlikeable main character. The only thing that I took from her character was that she acts like a brat all the time (thinking she's entitled to everything), has horrible communication skills, and likes to blame everything on other people even when it's not even in the realm of their fault. She felt so entitled to things like her family's store, in this book and while in some sense I understand building your entire personality around a store and seeing it struggling would be hard, the way she went about it was really annoying. She also never took advice from anyone and got mad at everyone in her life a lot. In my opinion, she needs to go to therapy to work on her coping and communication skills.

The love interest, Jasper? In the beginning, I was really interested in him, but as the "prank" war between him and Madeline began to gain traction, he got really annoying. He was doing things to her store that just? I really hated it. Granted she was too, she even vandalized his car at one point (and then fell in love with him hours later), but I feel like there should have come a point where both of them realized they should stop (before the accident that happens in the book). He just didn't give me the best vibes and then never really apologized for all the things he did to her and her store, and suddenly was the sweetest guy when they stopped the "war." It was like a complete 180 that felt so out of character I just could barely process it.

Enemies to lovers is my favorite trope so when I tell you that this was the worst example of it, I mean it. Objectively, there was no reason for them to be true enemies but also no reason for them to fall in love. A bookstore across the street? Okay, that doesn't mean you have to immediately hate him and start trying to ruin the store, Madeline. Oh, he's hot? Okay, that doesn't mean you should just forget about all the shitty things he did to you without apologizing for it.

Overall, I gave it an extra star because I really enjoyed listening to it on audiobook and the narrator was really nice to listen to. While there were some side characters I enjoyed, especially in Madeline's family, I really don't think it's a good read. There are countless other books that try to tackle the same subjects (complicated family relationships, graduating/college, rival stores, and more) and do it in much better ways. Admittedly, this has kind of turned me off from reading other books by this author but I'm going to try to keep my mind open.

[TW: parental abandonment, underage alcohol consumption, being hit by a car, blood and injury, sexual ideas & themes, brief sexual scenes]

[Ritz · Rating 1 out of 5]

All of the books I’ve read this month have been 3 stars. So believe me when I say I wanted to enjoy this. But I was so disappointed about this one. I came into this expecting a cute, banter filled enemies to lovers with rival bookstores. Instead, I got to read about Madeline, who’s rude and self-centered, by the way, blame others for her problems. So this book sucked.

Madeline was so annoying. She blamed others for her problems. She hated Jasper just because he worked for another bookstore. She was so rude to Astrid for no reason. Seriously, she got angry at her brother Benny for his dad being around. That’s actually so horrible. She kept on making it a competition between them, even though it was clear that Benny didn’t want to create an argument with her for no reason.

The romance was laughable. This was supposed to be enemies to lovers. So can someone remind me why Jasper and Madeline got together by the 50% mark? For some reason, Jasper already was in love with Madeline despite talking to her about 2 times. And then something happened and Madeline got mad at him. And then there was a stupid and childish prank war. The dynamic between the two was weird. It was just so inconsistent.

Where is the plot? Guess what? It doesn’t exist. There is nothing but bad dialogue and
Madeline whining and acting like an 8 year old for 350+ pages. This book would have been so much more enjoyable if it was shorter. And also, there are so many plot holes. So many things that the author doesn’t tie up, which was so frustrating.

My final issue with this book was Madeline’s relationship with her mom, Dahlia. I fully understand why Madeline would be upset with her mother, since she left her so many times. But it was so inconsistent. Madeline would hate Dahlia one moment, and then she would love her because she did some small thing. But the thing that made me the most angry was that she never actually talked to Dahlia about how her leaving made her feel, and how not having an actual mom was hard on her.

The reason this is 2 stars and not 1 star is because the side characters, Zelda, Benny, Ravi and Grant were likable, and I wish they were bigger characters.

[erin · Rating 3 out of 5]

rating: 3.5 stars
I have a review going up on my blog in a few weeks.


AHHHH WHYYYYYY??? I can't go too into depth about what I loved and what I didn't love, but this book is very ~intereesting~..... first of all, the main characters are 18 and 19, but they are written like thirty-year olds? The dialogue is so weird, and the characters are given barely any depth. Once again, the male character is simply there to aid her storyline and we don't learn much about him.

Overall, this could have been a LOT cuter, and it just wasn't what I was looking for in a romance about books(HELLLLOOOOO it sounds amazing?).




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