Reviews with content warning for Drug use - One Last Stop

If anything the representation in this book is on point. Though homophobia and racism is mentioned, it's not the main focus on the book. If anything Casey MqCuiston gave us a story where people's background can be casually mentioned. No big deal, no big drama.

This is a queer romance that shows us all aspects of falling in love with someone. From the denial to the fear of losing them. From pure joy to the insecurities that come along with letting someone close.

I am also super happy about how there are plenty of hints to the people from the LGBTQIA+ community who fought so hard for our rights and freedom. Not the mention the ode to drag queens. They are portrayed as openhearted, protective, loving and determinated people instead of bitches. Casey has shown us how the community can be such a warm and welcoming place.

I also love how even side-characters get a background story. They aren't just some decoration for the story. There is a depth to them that makes everything more realistic even when the author plays with timelines.

There are only a few minor things that bugged me just a little. The first part of the story has plenty of scenes (sometimes super random ones) where the focus is on August's virginity. I know society portrays virginity as a shame once you reach a certain age. Yet I felt weird when reading how the character shames herself on this and there isn't much else done with it. At least I didn't feel like a lot was done to this.

I also feel as if some things conveniently happened when the characters were facing a problem. Sometimes it felt too convenient to me.

However those two elements are literally the only thing that bugged me throughout this book. I would highly recommend this books if you want queer romance, a diverse cast of characters and a bit of a mindfuck. Heck, I wasn't able to put down the book for the last 100 pages because I was absolutely hooked and needed to know how the mystery would be taken care of...

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jkneebone's review

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emotional inspiring mysterious slow-paced

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

3.5

Casey McQuiston tackles time-travel romance in One Last Stop. August is a new arrival to Brooklyn, a wanderer trying to distance herself from her mother - and her mother's obsession with the cold case of her brother's disappearance forty-plus years before - who still hasn't found a place to settle down. On the Q train, she meets Jane Su, a 70s-style punk lesbian...who's actually from the 70s. She's trapped in time, and August is ready to use her deeply engrained investigative skills to figure out who Jane is, where she came from - and how to get her back where she belongs.

Things I adored about this book: The side characters - all of August's coworkers at Pancake Billy's, and especially her roommates-slash-found family-slash-band of misfits. The descriptions of NYC and especially Brooklyn. August's complicated relationship with her mother. Jane's backstory, and the window it gives into queer history. The simmering, sultry relationship between Jane and August, and how we get to see it develop. The side plot about fighting gentrification. How aggressively queer it is (the cast of characters are almost entirely LGBT, and August & co frequently attend drag shows etc).

Things I struggled with about this book: The fact that it is explicitly set in 2020 when it was published in summer 2021 (I know it was probably already written & edited pre-pandemic, but changing the dates would have been - to me - a good use of time). The pacing (it drags at the beginning). The genre combo/overlap of sci-fi(?) and romance (usually in romance, you know the characters will end up together, and I spent way too much time worrying because I didn't know *how* that could possibly work out).

Although I ultimately really enjoyed this when I finally finished, it took me a looooong time to get through it. I kept starting, getting distracted, reading ahead, then putting it down and not wanting to come back to it. I didn't realize going in that it was a time travel book, and I was really having trouble reconciling the romance conceits I would usually expect with the unfamiliar, how-to-get-Jane-unstuck plot that felt at times very uncertain. I don't think this is a fault or a failure of McQuiston's - if anything it's a failure of the way we market books - because it was a cool idea that was pulled off really well in the end. But I did dock a half-star from my overall rating since it was so hard for me to get into the book at first.

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readenpiper's review

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4.0

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kittykatruin's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful lighthearted mysterious reflective fast-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? It's complicated

4.5

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teslis's review

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hopeful lighthearted mysterious medium-paced

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

3.0

This is the second book of the year for the bookclub!

In the beginning I really liked it, but then during the middle I didn’t love is as much after talking to a friend about the book. But then later on I liked it again, but (!) the end, I’m sorry but it made me disappointed! I had hope for at least five other ways the book could end on that I thought would be a more real end but it was still interesting to read!

I don’t know why, but I couldn’t picture the characters appearance a lot of the time :( and I mixed up Nico and Was which was annoying!

It was a nice book to read and discuss with friends about! I didn’t love it but it was still a good book!

Took me exactly 11 hours to read!

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redheadorganist's review

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adventurous emotional funny mysterious sad 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? It's complicated

3.5

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luananki's review

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emotional funny hopeful 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? It's complicated

4.25

i might be biased bc i read my partner’s annotated version but i completely forgot how much of a sucker i am for wattpad-y romcoms sometimes. i enjoyed one last stop a lot. it left me with tears in my eyes, trying not to laugh out loud in the train and on the edge of my seat. i had so much fun with it, the only aspects that don’t sit right with me are the sex and making out scenes in the train but i guess it was to be expected and at the end that’s just where the story unfolded itself. also, the chapters could’ve been kept shorter, imo

but all in all, fun read

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emory's review

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funny lighthearted slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

Would like to start by saying I'm really annoyed at whoever did the cover art for not knowing what "butch" means.

Secondly, this book was squarely not for me. Which surprised me, because I really enjoyed another book by this author; this makes me think that that was simply because I was 18 years old and maybe a little stupid at the time.

I don't normally read romance; just not for me, but I was looking for something to fit a reading challenge prompt and of course I was excited about one of the only (popular I wasnt doing deep dives) sapphic romance novels I could find that actually featured a masculine woman instead of two feminine women. So much praise for that by the way.

As for the writing itself, the narration has a truly unique tone and voice, but the problem is that it became extremely grating to me after a few chapters. Bunches of detailed lists may set the scene, but it does not make for good writing. It's just lousy with gerunds and dependent clauses and unnecessary "quotable" moments. Oh god the unnecessary quotable moments. The writing will be heartfelt and be genuinely nice to read, and you'll be pulled out of it for a quip or for what truly feels like a sentence shoved through a square hole in an attempt to get it highlighted and put on the Goodreads quotes page.

I enjoyed the plot and was drawn in by the premise. The execution left a bit to be desired, however, as instead of developing the actually compelling and thoughtful conflict that the main characters have, McQuiston opts instead to shove that into a single conversation that our main character herself can tell is caused by ridiculous reasons and is resolved by, get this,

Spoiler

not talking to each other until they both start to feel bad about it.

The interesting conflict gets sidelined to the formulaic temporary breakup, and our author opts instead to drive the story and main romance forward with the fact that our protagonist feels a completely absurd uncertainty about whether she and Jane are still just friends. She honest to God still calls them friends

Spoiler

after they have literally had sex.

The book could have easily been 100+ pages shorter; to draw it out while the main character paces back and forth wondering if the out lesbian who is constantly hitting on her and literally actually making out with her ~likes her that way~ is inane. I understand that was purposeful and for comedic effect, but it doesn't make it any less ridiculous.

The subplots tie together in what is ultimately a predictable but still cute and satisfying way, even if I wish it had happened a little faster. I enjoy the element of August finding a family at the same time as she finds a romance, but I wish it felt earned. She's very much just dropped in and absorbed into a friend group, and I'd say more than half of this takes place "off screen". Honestly though, I don't know if I would have wanted it to be part of the novel anyway. It feels mean to say, but I just think I'm entirely above the age demographic for this book, despite the fact that I'm younger than it's protagonists. The characters whose friend group August, the main character, falls into, are written to be quirky and silly. Most of the time this just comes off as obnoxious. It feels as if almost every piece of their dialogue and quite a few of the narrative quips from August's POV are ripped from some viral tweet or meme. Certainly many of the punchlines are. It starts to feel like a quota of the amount of things you can get a tiktoker to say "hey, I know that one!" to. McQuiston is playing all the hits, such as, off the top of head based on eye roll severity: "that little twink contains multitudes", "big dick energy is gender neutral", "you useless [sexuality]", "homoerotic queer girl friendship", "gay panic" [to refer to being nervous around a crush -_-], "the [x] jumped out", and we even get a so what's the deal with House Hunters, am I right? Didn't laugh when I saw it on a meme repost page, am not laughing now. The author is too caught up in trying to make every character fill in enough quirky bubbles to realize that having a person you just met say "oh, so that's your problem. I was wondering" after telling them something sensitive about yourself is kind of... horrifying, actually? Lots of joking in here comes across as a little mean spirited when you remember that these characters supposedly just met one another.

I can't say the same for August and Jane. McQuiston really does write their relationship full of chemistry and sweet interactions, and it kept me wanting to read despite being a bit irritated with other aspects of the book. Their feelings are very well put with so much heart behind them... as long as they're not some joke about how nervous August is (remember about the quips pulling you out of an otherwise adeptly written paragraph?). My biggest complaint is that while August is described pretty heavily, her actions directly contradict her early characterization.

Spoiler

Described as anxious and eager to isolate herself, she throws herself into and immediately makes friends with all her new roomates, sitting in the living room just to casually chat about her missing uncle. We're told she's skeptical and logical, but she almost immediately believes Niko's psychic ability and her first theory of what's going on with Jane is vampirism. We're told she's depressed but she juggles new roomates, a romance, a job, classwork, and solving a mystery expertly.

. I was a fan of the unique backstory, but wish it amounted to more than a wacky setup for a punchline about liking true crime and being a detective. Additionally,

Spoiler

while it is set up that August faces borderline neglect from her mother, this is not condemned by the narrative; again, it is on a surface level, but in the end, her mother forcing her to obsess over her missing uncle pays off by getting her a girlfriend, finding her uncle, and then bringing her a freelance investigator job--apparently her life's purpose!

I can accept that it wasn't meant to be that deep, but it's still a bit annoying. As for Jane, I only wish there were aspects of her personality that shone through without the narrative having to explain why she had that trait and what it means. Quite a bit felt like an afterthought, including her being from the 70s, which is a bit of a big deal...

Other complaints in list form bc I'm tired of typing about something I didn't enjoy and shouldn't have read in the first place: hamfistedly boring attempt to "make New York a character", the brushing over of how many differences a lesbian from the 70s and a bi girl from today would have to bridge, Myla definitely had some weird characterization , piss poor explanation of how the time travel worked, etc etc.

Very nitpicky, I realize, but that's what happens when I read 400 pages of something I started getting annoyed with about 1/4 of the way in. Fine for what it is, not for me. Would like to congratulate the author, though, for writing a romance between two characters that was cute and compelling enough it not only made me want to drag my way through a book I wasn't really enjoying, but also made me look past the fact that

Spoiler

they fuck on the subway.

Think I'm for sure done giving romance novels a try, though.

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