Truly, the most true-to-life depiction of small liberal arts college in a small town life I’ve ever read. This book was ENTHRALLING. I couldn’t put it down. Daisy Alpert Florin’s debut My Last Innocent Year is compelling and fast-paced. My only complaint is the lack of character development on behalf of many of the characters; I was excited to read every moment, but I can’t say that many characters changed as people by the end. That said, a very fun read and an absolute 4.5 stars recommend to any lover of academia and thrill.

This type of book goes in the same category for me as My Dark Vanessa, which is an excellent and poignant tale of sexual assault and it’s impacts. This one lacked the emotional drive to push through the style of narrative we are given. The writing is beautiful, sure, and the topics are complex and painful — but it just didn’t take it home in the way I expected. However, I always love a honest discussion of coming of age, where the main character has to tackle traumatic circumstances, so I appreciate what My Last Innocent Year brought to the table.

"I would soon come to understand that adulthood was exactly this, the constant upending of everything you believed when you were young."

absolutely brilliant. a book about girlhood vs. womanhood, learning what kind of person you are, and recognizing your own worth. the writing was phenomenal, so many lines and passages were just perfectly crafted.

there were definitely shades of my dark vanessa, one of my favorite books, but less isolated (and also less gut-wrenching). in my last innocent year, there was also more going on outside of the teacher/student relationship. and i love both vanessa and isabel as protagonists, but it was a lot easier reading from isabel's point of view rather than vanessa's.

personally, this book ticked a lot of boxes for me: female protagonist, academic setting, dead mother, toxic relationship, on & on. BUT i would recommend this book to anybody, even if none of those aspects sound interesting, because the honesty & coming of age narrative are just so great.

i received an ARC from netgalley, but when this comes out i'm definitely buying a copy and highlighting the shit out of it.

My Last Innocent Year follows Isabel, a 21/22-year-old senior at a small liberal arts college in New Hampshire through her final semester as an English major with a talent and desire for writing. Isabel is from New York City, where she grew up in the Lower East Side. Her father owns a Jewish Appetizing store (they sell fish, bread, cream cheese, etc., but no meat!), and her mother was a painter who passed away from cancer when Isabel was a teenager. The book begins with Isabel having a nonconsensual, though not overly jarring or violent, sexual encounter with a college friend that gets mishandled, and the story continues from there. During her second and final semester, she gets involved in a sexual relationship with one of her professors. This leads her down a path of discovery not only about herself, but about the private lives of her teachers.

I thought this book was beautifully written and I enjoyed my experience with it. It was extremely slow-paced because the writing is heavy with detail and character-driven, but I thought it had a lot to say. It was set in 1997-1998, at the peak of the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal, and the story draws some great parallels between how men and women are viewed in those situations. I thought it captured the essence of my college experience, particularly during that last year--there is an uncertainty of what happens next, a seeking of approval and recognition, a fear of being thrown out into the world without knowing how to navigate it, and a general uneasiness at being expected to make adult decisions when you yourself still feel like a kid. All of that being said, the characters? They're not great people, but I still found myself drawn to them. I was disappointed with our main character once she enters into adulthood and the choices she makes, but real people are not constantly good and not constantly bad. These characters feel whole and real because of their choices.

I wouldn't say this book has a complete dark academia vibe, but it definitely has some sort of academia aesthetic if you're drawn to books like that. It's a quiet sort of book where things are understated and simple, but again, really well written. Thank you to Henry Holt & Co. and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. This title publishes February 14, 2023.

I thought that the author did a good job depicting mental health and sexual assault. I didn’t completely love this book; I disliked most of the characters. It was still an interesting book, and I’m glad I read it.

My Last Innocent Year is a striking portrait of womanhood that I connected with in more ways than I can count. I appreciate the way that the author wove a complex and provocative story without relying on sensationalism or shock value. In this way, the story felt more approachable than similar books I've read (for example, My Dark Vanessa).

This book was very thought provoking. It reminded me about how as a teenager I did a lot of the same things the MC did such as letting others guide her decisions and not really knowing her next steps (I think we can all relate to her at some point). It was a very well written account of the struggles of a young woman at that weird phase where we are technically women with a juvenile mind. I really liked it although I wish she would have stuck up for herself more.

This was thought-provoking and Florin has a way with prose, to be sure. I felt somewhat detached fromthe characters, particularly Isabel - even though I do feel they were written in a beautiful way. It handled heavy topics with honesty and grace. I do think the story itself is one that has been visited before in ways I enjoyed more (My Dark Vanessa, also kind of reminded me of The Yonahlasee Riding Camp for Girls). Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC!

"My Last Innocent Year" was a solid read. It reminded me of "My Dark Vanessa" and "Writers & Lovers," but I didn't like it as much as either of those books. It did remind me a lot of the overall feeling of senior year of college, nostalgia for youth, fear of the next step, and all that. It definitely brought up those feels for me, and I loved the New England vibes. Worth a read!

This book was off to a very slow start, and I found myself feeling unattached from Isabel, the main character, for a vast majority of the book. I should have felt sympathetic to her, or at least connected to her in some way, because she was a senior in college figuring out what comes next, and I was that exact same girl not too long ago. And usually I love books with female main characters who are unhinged and make bad decisions, but for some reason I just couldn't get into it all that much.

The last third of My Last Innocent Year flew by a lot faster than the first third, and that was when I finally started to actually enjoy the reading experience. Still, it wasn't enough to totally make up for the way I couldn't get into it for most of the book. I liked Isabel enough by the end, but I didn't care much for her friends or even for her family. The writing style of this book was good, but again, not good enough to make me completely ignore how much I had to drag myself through the book (although I would be interested in seeing what Daisy Alpert Florin does next, because there were a lot of moments where the writing style really shone).

One thing that I think this book did really well was the writing within the book. Usually I strongly dislike when books get all meta and include writing within writing (I almost always find that poetry written by characters in books is insufferably bad), but this one did it right in my opinion, including enough writing to make us know that Isabel is talented but not too much that we were distracted from the rest of the story. Another thing that I think this book got right was its exploration of complex characters, especially towards the end when Isabel had a lot of tough decisions to make and a lot of things crashing down around her. That was when I really started to feel like I cared for her and understood her, and I enjoyed those moments where her complexity shone through.

Overall, I didn't love this book, but I also didn't hate it. There were parts that really stuck out to me, but the beginning was just so slow that it was hard to get into it. It didn't grip me the way I want a story to until the end, when everything started to come together, but it was still an enjoyable read.

Throughly enjoyed My Last Innocent Year, can’t wait until pub date to recommend it!
Thoughtful and enjoyable to read, really makes you think and examine relationships and coming of age. As a mom of a teen this almost off to college it really resonates with me. Hope you all pick it up and enjoy!

3.5 rounded up.

This was an easy read in the sense that the writing flowed easily and was well put together. This story tackled touch subjects like mental health, rape and inappropriate relationships with a professor. The setting was well laid out, and Daisy Alpert Florin's prose was beautiful.

Typically when I read a book that tackles tough issues like these, I am fully ruined emotionally at the end. Unfortunately I did not feel connected to Isabel enough to be all in.

This was a good book, and I recommend it, it's just not one I would read over and over again.

This was a fairly dark coming-of-age story, but with that being said, it was a realistic portrait for many individual's experiences. The book covers several dark themes, ranging from sexual assault to suicide, so if you aren't in the most stable headspace, I would put the book down for a little bit until you felt ready. I'm a fan of dark academia and while this wasn't similar in plot to something like If We Were Villians, the aura was there.

I highly enjoyed the read and will be recommending it to others!

3.5 stars

The story is set on a college campus in the northeast in the '90's. Our main character Isabel is a Jewish New-Yorker aspiring to become an author. Her senior year takes a bit of a tumble, when right before winter break she has a nonconsensual sexual encounter and is unsure how to react to it. When she returns to campus, she's propelled into an affair with her married professor.

What I loved about this story (& the writing) is that it all felt very natural, it progressed in a way that felt real. The emotions were layered and thoughtful, but mostly had a breezy tone to them. Isabel deals with a variety of things and interacts with many different people. Her thoughts are on display for us and its clear she doesn't really know how to feel about much of what is happening to her and around her.

This was a fairly quick read and I do wish it went a LITTLE deeper overall. I found the intersection between her identity, her ethnicity and culture and the desire to be a writer very interesting. I also thought the balanced weaving of parallel consent discussions was really well done. The author lost me towards the second half/ending where the plot sort of moves away from Isabel and on-to another teacher couple (it became a bit of a thriller rather than the literary stream-of-consciousness that dominated the first parts).

Overall, I enjoyed it but didn't feel like it was as strong as comparable books (i.e. [book:My Dark Vanessa|44890081]) but I will definitely keep my eye out for the author's future books.

Nergalley provided this ARC to me in exchange for an honest review.

This book definitely held my attention. It's really, really good. Go in blind and enjoy.

I found the writing to be really beautiful honestly. I liked Isabel as a character because she enjoyed writing and her silly little school girl crush was kind of fun to watch at the beginning but I found myself bored with the actual story. I so wish I would’ve enjoyed this more. Maybe I’ll come back to it another time and see if the story jumps out at me.

I think this is a sold contender for one of the best novels to be released in 2023. We are introduced to Isabel, who is reckoning who she is through the relationships in her life. We learn about who she has loved and who she has lost, and the gritty events in between. I loved the setting of 1998 with the added wildness that was the Clinton & Lewinsky scandal- both clever and ironic. We see Isabel and all of her flaws, but we are also able to empathize with her in some ways. This book made me think, which is my favorite kind. Thank you Henry Holt and Co. and Netgalley for the free review ecopy!

Enjoyed this thought provoking book. A look at the decisions we make and how they impact our life both in the present and the future.

I really enjoyed this book. You can feel the disconnect and trauma from the main character. I don’t read a lot of contemporary fiction but I really liked this book. This book stands out for me because I can feel the depth of the emotions Isabel has. As a narrator she comes across as cold but as the book progresses, she gains immense amounts of depth. I tend to read books really quickly, like in one sitting. But the emotional depth that this book requires forced me to take breaks and really dive into the story.

The story of a young woman's transitions from college student to adult and the experiences often associated with co-ed life. A story that trys to address rape culture, me too, and a family's difficult relationships.

I really wanted to like this book and was hoping for a plot to develop. It was a difficult narrative while trying to engage in the social issues being addressed. It was a great idea but just needed more development. I liked it and finished it hoping it would have a complete ending.