This one was a swing and a miss for me. I didn't realize going in that there was such a substantial age gap, 19 and 41 is really just too much for me and made me largely uncomfortable. Also, while I'm not usually a huge fan of a slow burn, I really felt this one moved too quickly and that there wasn't enough buildup and development into the relationship. A little tension can be nice sometimes.

Another thing I felt really could have benefited from some greater editing and greater thought was the character voices. It was oftentimes difficult to differentiate between them and I found myself having to go back, reread, and evaluate who was being spoken about and who was speaking. I also largely found the actions of the friends to be unrealistic and overly tropey. Well, I don't think this is a bad book necessarily. It's just not my cup of tea and unfortunately not the kind of romance I usually go for.

Thank you to Netgalley and A.S Kelly for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I was excited for this book as soon as I got the ARC and really enjoy both the second chance and brother's friend tropes. But for many reasons, I genuinely could not get into this book. No matter what I did, I just was not enjoying it.

There were too many situations in this book that just made me want to put it down and not pick it back up. the age gap was way too large, especially for my liking. A 19 year old and a 41 year old is not what I expected going into this book.

The book itself was very confusing from the way it was written. I found myself going back to reread certain parts because I couldn't figure our who was who and who was being spoken about.

The couple had no chemistry whatsoever. There was no build up of their relationship or any development in their relationship. From the second she entered her apartment he was beaming at her like she was the light of his life. Maybe it's just me but I found it a little disappointing that there was no build up of tension before they began making their feelings obvious to each other and those around them.

All in all, the book was very repetitive and not something I enjoyed.

Thank you to netgalley for providing me with an ARC copy of this book.

Loved this book! It was cute romcom type read, and I really enjoyed Rian's voice and how she told her story. There was humor, a little self depreciation, and definitely some soul searching. I adored her cute high school crush and how that transformed throughout her life, and how she was always there for Parker.

The family aspect of the book was refreshing, and seeing Rian bond with Parker's daughter was cute and heart warming. I especially appreciated how Parker was always looking out for what he thought was best for Rian, even if he was completely wrong! I eat up love interests who are conscious of their faults, and try and change their ways! The friend group made me miss my friends and want to hit them up. I really enjoyed being able to go through the internal struggle Parker went through thinking he wasn't good enough for Rian. But Rian proving to him that they deserved each other and that their relationship was worth it in every way, even when things were tough and messy, was the cherry on top.

A.S Kelly made me a new fan of her writing and her characters. I was transported into a romcom and didn't want to come back to the real world!

If you enjoy age gap tropes then this one is for you. Personally in not a big fan of large age gaps but I’m sure there is a market for them. It’s just not me.

I will say that the short chapters and cover were both a big seller in my eyes.

I'm sorry but this book just wasn't for me, Some aspects of the relationship between the main characters were too much for me that I couldn't really enjoy the rest of the book. I looked forward to reading it, and it may be for others, but it was just not my type of book.
I appreciate the opportunity to read it, and I look forward to hear more about this author.

"One Last Kiss": 2⭐

(Unpaid Review: thank you to @netgalley, @askellyauthor and the publishers for allowing me to read this eArc copy in exchange for a review.)

So, I went through this book blindly. I didn't even read the description. I requested it on Netgalley as soon as I laid eyes on the cover. Can you blame me?

As soon as I met the characters, the level of my uncomfortableness was disastrous. Age gap is just not for me and it's my fault really. I just can't deal with 20 years apart 😬

The writing is really cute and fluid, though! I would have loved it if it were a lesser age gap.

Reviewed by Cristiana Marques

Thank you to NetGalley for providing an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

One Last Kiss is the 3rd book of the Love At Last series by A. S. Kelly., but it can be read as a standalone,
I really liked both the cover and the blurb, it seemed fun but the book itself made me have mixed feelings and I was pretty disappointed by it.

The age gap between the characters just didn't work for me, in fact, I was kind of disturbed by reading how she's 19, and him 41 throughout the whole book. However, an aspect of the book that I enjoyed was the scenes with the twins, their relationship with Rian was adorable.

Thank you Netgalley and publishers for giving me the chance to read and review this book.

I would say One last kiss was a three star rating. It definitely had potential though I am not a fan of a huge age difference in romances.

The writing was mostly good though the pacing was slow sometimes and the changes of point of characters was not always clear.

This said it could be read as a standalone, but it felt like readers would still be benefitted if they read the other books first because some of the stuff that was said hinted to what happened in the past and the reader was supposed to automatically know about it.

I would definitely recommend reading the other books first.

I loved the girls though, they were so cute and lively! I also liked Rian too.

First, I would like to thank netgalley, A. S. Kelly and the publisher for allowing me to read this e-arc in exchange for an honest review.

The synopsis pulled me in immediately, I thought the writing style would be quirky, light and fun.
While it was, I had some difficulties with the writing. At times I found it really difficult to differentiate between Parker and Rian's voices, their inner dialogues and the way they speak were really similar. As well, I couldn't stand when Parker would at times say "dear reader". It was so few times and felt so sporadic that when it wasn't being said it didn't seem as though the MC's were speaking to a "reader". It would have been more effective, in my opinion to either not have those moments or to have them nearly every chapter.

One other issue I had in the beginning of the book was that Parker kept eluding to their shared past being so bad, it felt as though the "bad" thing was that he kissed her while underage. That fact almost turned me off from the book entirely.

Otherwise, this book was a slow read for me but definitely picked up closer to the end. Overall, I did enjoy it but don't think I would recommend.

Okay? I don't know how to feel about it. I liked it, kinda. I liked the girls. I didn't believe the relationship. I love that the hero was a firefighter.

This romance largely revolves around Rían and Parker and will they won’t they be able to work around the issues holding them back from a HEA.

The MCs and their friends/family are all realistically fleshed out and I enjoyed settling into their every day life and rooting for things to work out.

The beginning was a little rocky or abrupt in that I didn’t get a good feel of the characters and background, like I was dropping in on chapter 3 or 4 instead. There was a lot of rehashing instances with friends that didn’t add a lot to the story so it could have been shorter.

A.S. Kelly knows how to write heart tugging scenes and tastefully steamy ones alike. But I would recommend steering clear if you don’t enjoy age gap romances. I myself don’t mind them and even so at times found myself slightly uncomfortable with how things were proceeding.

Thank you Netgalley and Xpresso Book Tours for the e-arc.

2.5 Stars ⭐️⭐️💫

I have to say I have a lot of mixed feelings about this book. I loved the rom com feel and the sarcastic, love/hate relationship between some of the characters. However, there were multiple things that have lead to my rating. With the fast paced dialogue it sometimes became unclear as to who was actually speaking in the moment. The age gap between the love interests was pretty extreme (19 & 41), which lead to some internal cringing (but to each their own). The infuriating internal conflict in both leads was hard to bear (why can’t characters just say what they mean instead of continually misleading each other?!).

The relationships in this book between family and friends, including the male lead’s twins daughters, definitely made this book a fun read. This is the third book in the series (did not know this prior to beginning the book) and their relationships make me want to go back to and see how they were built just to get a little more of them!

This can be read as a standalone, but it is true that it is connected to the other books in the Love At Last series by A. S. Kelly.

I have to say that I was very excited to start reading this book since it had one of my favorite tropes, a single father that refuses to fall in love with anyone because his children are the most important thing in his life but fails to do so. The book did delivered that, but I just have to say that I didn’t feel any connection with these two protagonists.

I might have to warn a few readers and say that this book has an age gap between its characters, Parker is 19 years old while Rain is 41 years old. I myself wasn’t so fond to find out like this about the difference in age, for once because these two people are at such different steps in life that I don’t really find it in myself to believe that they would make a good couple. Apart from that, the age gap wouldn’t have been so bad if the book didn’t gave me second hand embarrassment at some parts.

The writing was easy enough to follow, but I found myself confused by the dialogue. It was difficult to know who was speaking and to whom. The problem is that there was much more dialogue than narrative, so it is obviously a problem to not understand what is going on in the dialogue. Apart from that I really liked the addition of the side characters, and I loved Rain’s daughters the most!

Thank you NetGalley and Xpresso Book Tours!

One Last Kiss (Love at Last ) by A.S Kelly.

2 Stars

I have very mixed feelings regarding this book. I liked the element of an age-gap between Rain and Parker. It happens to be one of my favorite tropes. However, I found myself very frustrated by both of them.
Parker is a divorced single father of twin girls scorned by love and Rain appears to be a shy, yoga teacher pining after Parker ever since the night he saved her. They have feelings for each other or perhaps it's just lust at first, but something is there that they can't seem to forget after that night. Parker is afraid of getting his heart broken and he won't risk hurting his little girls. Rain wants Parker to want her, but she lacks the courage to really go for him. Luckily they have a close friend group and they are both being pushed on both sides to take a leap of faith.

I believe most of my frustration with this read came from being slightly confused with the dialogue. I found myself getting lost in who was speaking and to whom. I found this book hard to follow especially when it contained mostly dialogue. I did however, like the personalities of the supporting characters. The friends were funny and witty but not particularly clever in their plans to push the couple together. I also liked how the author incorporated the "aside" device with Parker, I would've liked to see more of that. I found it to be fun and different.

Overall I would say I didn't love this book. It wasn't a bad book, maybe just not for me. Conflicts that could easily be solved by communication don't excite me. I just find myself frustrated begging the characters to get their head out of their own a**.

Release Date: [ 20 Aug 2021 ]

Thank you NetGalley and Xpresso Book Tours

arc provided by net galley
this book would’ve been better if the age gap wasn’t that bad, i know it’s legal but the main character being 19yr old and the love interest being 41yr made me a bit uncomfortable.
the writing was light and fun but the second hand embarrassment this book gave me was like.. too much.
rian’s brother (niall) and his daughters is the reason why i finished the book tbh and they were the only characters i really enjoyed reading about.

I really wanted to like this one. The premise seemed fun and I love a secret crush romance. That being said, this one didn’t live up to the blurb. Independently, the characters are likable and cool/quirky. Collectively, they didn't give me a reason to want to keep reading. A few things I struggled with are listed before.

1. Huge age gap. She’s 19 and he’s 41. This should definitely be made clear in the blurb for the book,
2. Sometimes I couldn’t discern who was speaking.
3. Sometimes the hero spoke directly to the reader. It felt like a diary entry he was narrating. It was weird.
4. It felt juvenile more times than not.
5. It’s set in Ireland, but many colloquiums felt Kiwi.

One Last Kiss has potential, but needs some rewriting and a strong edit before it can be realized.

The banter is this book is very interesting and characters are likeable. Will they or won't they was a lot of back and forth in this novel, and it was a bit much for me. When Rian and Parker did get together, though, it was a lot of fun. Though I did find myself battling with the age difference between the two (she 19, him 41, but that is just a personal choice. This book had so much potential, but I couldn't seem to connect with it. I liked Rian, and the age difference between him and Parker didn't bother me. Parker's first love interest was also only 20 years old, which was inconvenient. The males were also meant to be in their late 30s/early 40s, yet they acted juvenile the majority of the time. This is part of a series that can be read independently, although there isn't much history for the supporting characters, so reading the other novels first might be beneficial (I have not read them). I would have liked to see a little background brought in to refresh past readers and provide a better idea to new readers.

this was a quick read but i will warn other readers that there is an age gap between the two main characters. the age gap trope is not offputting to me normally, especially when it's two people genuinely making a connection, but Parker has a history of falling for younger women? it just sets off so many red flags for me and comes across as creepy especially when it's a 40+ year old man.

a lot of contemporary romance novels have the whole misunderstanding + making up thing but i felt like Parker just KEPT screwing up and it was so overdone. it drove me crazy that Rian (the 19 year old girl) had to be the mature one every damn time, like Parker please for the love of god stop being a manchild.

the book wasn't poorly written or anything, i think the characters rubbed me the wrong way. maybe if i had read the previous books in this series i would have had more of a connection to the story and/or characters but i didn't.

This is such a fun to read novel with great dialog and characters. Rotating perspectives give a look into the feelings and happenings of love blossoming amid longings, fears, and probability.
I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Thank you to #Netgalley for an advanced copy of this novel for a fair and honest review. A.S. Kelly shares the struggle of twenty year old Rian and forty year old fire fighter, single father of twins, Parker to overcome the shadow of the past and preconceived notions of what the future can be to find love in this charming second chance love story set in Ireland. One Last Kiss concludes a trio of novels in which friends in a small Irish town find true love. I have not read the first two books in the series which made my understanding of Parker and Rian’s struggle to be together at times difficult to follow. That said, I recommend that anyone who enjoys a small town, second chance romance with a beautiful setting and filled with well intentioned, meddlesome secondary characters pick all of the books in this series by talented author A.S. Kelly