Reviews with content warning for Police brutality - One Last Stop: Der letzte Halt ist erst der Anfang

As sad as this may be, One Last Stop showed me that contemporary romance is just not my genre since I gave the book 2.5 stars. It just bored me so much that I thought of DNFing it, and the magical aspect of the story was way too underdeveloped to keep me interested – a classical case of “it’s not you, it’s me”. The only thing I really enjoyed was how queer the story was but not much more.

The story focusses on August who moves to New York to start a new life. There, she meets Jane on public transport with whom she falls in love with instantly. She notices that Jane never leaves the train and finds out that there seems to be some magic that is keeping her there since the 1970s. We then get the big drama and an arbitrary time limit when repair work is planned at the line for which it has to be shut down and no one knows what will happen to Jane then. Here, it becomes clear for the first time that the premise doesn’t work out perfectly. Was the line not shut down since the 1970s? Were there not some repair works before?

Anyways, the rest of the plot focuses on – surprise! – the romance between Jane and August. I don’t know what to think about it honestly? I’ll have to say that because of the setting of public transport, there were many scenes that me uncomfortable like the spicy ones – some people may be into this, but I’m definitely not. In the end, I started to find them cute, but I felt not much more between them.

Besides this, we have some random family drama about the brother of August’s mom. August became kinda unlikable for me here because she’s so mean to her mother and complaining so much that she has to help her to look for her brother. I don’t know, seems a first world problem to me. She also never tries to see the things like her mom does not think about how traumatic this must be for her mom and how she tries to cope with it. This plot is solved way too conveniently because

Jane suddenly knew the brother

Another problem I had was with the writing itself. There are barely any descriptions of the subway or the surroundings. The dialogues were too try-hard funny for me and just a bit too much. I also had the feeling that many interesting aspects of the story were told and not shown. For example, I would love to see more about August’s university life. Furthermore, it is only told to us how she gets closer to her flat mates but not shown; same goes for the backstories of the characters – of course, I don’t mean flashbacks by this but there are so many interesting ways with which the backstory of a character can be shown.

Coming to the characters, I wasn’t the biggest fan of August. One of the reasons was her behaviour towards her mom, like mentioned above. She’s also one of those book characters that don’t need to study but still have amazing grades. Those people exist but they are overproportioned in fiction which sends some weird signals to people who have to study to get good grades. I didn’t like Jane so much either? She was just too extroverted for me – like I said, a “me-problem”. Just imagining her dancing through the whole tram while some people just want to go to work makes me cringe, same goes for all the characters celebrating a party there. The side characters in comparison were great, and I love how queer they were. They’re one of the reasons that I’m giving a half extra star because I got quite attached to them.

Like I’ve said in the beginning, One Last Stop is probably the right book for man people but just not for me: It was too contemporary for me and is probably already outdated in five years. Additionally, just reading about this big city life made me anxious, so yeah, not my cup of tea.

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annoyedhumanoid's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

August's roommates were my favorite part, i love the found family trope, which made me a little disappointed with their brief plot line resolutions, but other than that i enjoyed the plot and was satisfied with the ending. i appreciated the writing, it's improved from their debut Red, White & Royal Blue. i was extremely uncomfortable during the public sex scene 😬. 4⅜ stars
cover design review: ★★☆☆☆. yikes, it's just overwhelming. let's count the different typefaces: author name (1), bestselling author (2), title (3), "a novel" (4), Q line symbol (5), and tagline (6). all the different colors, three shades of purplish pink that don't go well together, the "S" is higher than the "TOP" in "STOP", Jane's posture looks stiff and unnatural, just very disappointing. the Spanish edition is gorgeous 😭 and the Portuguese edition is good too, love the art style and the easter eggs from the story but i think the character design is somewhat juvenile

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therainbowshelf's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful lighthearted mysterious reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Super cute! The author did a great job of developing the supernatural mystery surrounding Jane in a way that felt natural with no conclusion jumping (except by August when she decided Jane might be a vampire 😂). The romance development was also excellent and I found myself rooting for August and Jane the whole time.

📘The Gist 📘: In her ongoing quest to escape her own life, August moves to an apartment in New York. On possibly the worst day of her year, she runs into a kind, gorgeous woman on the subway who gives her a train. Coincidentally, the woman is on the same train the next time August boards. And the next time! And the next... It occurs to August that these coincidences are a little too much to ignore.

📒Representation📒: wlw mc, Asian American mc, trans sc, mlm sc, drag queens, bipoc sc

💕 For readers looking for 💕: A sweet and steamy romance, SciFi elements, a New York story, the subway, mystery, sense memories, a charming cast of characters, LGBTQ+

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nicamooch's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional funny inspiring mysterious relaxing medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

I know relatability to a character isn’t everything but there is something special in connecting with a character and their experiences, especially when it isn’t one you’ve gotten to see depicted before. It’s just nice to read about a 23yo who doesn’t have shit worked out, who is afraid of graduating, who has no experience in love, who’s working for the first time, living in a big city away from all she knows—that isolation, being miles away from anyone who not only knows you but also /cares/ about you. Being broke af, being tempted to skip class on days that start off wrong or just wanting to spend some more time with friends. Making friends, especially close friends, when you’ve never really had any and don’t know how (I absolutely adore the found family in this book).

Moving to a city and having to take public transport everyday—falling in love with a stranger over a train ride and forgetting they exist once you alight.

Having a crush and just, a very deep infatuation for the first time—gosh August and Jane were so cute and the audiobook narrator for this book emotes August’s inner thoughts phenomenally.

I loved this book! I don’t typically choose to read contemporary romance but this one has a (paranormal-ish) twist! And the mystery was good and the character relationships & friendships were 💛💛💛 & I cried so much in the last quarter 😭

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