The Last Love Song

De: Kalie Holford

Narrado por: Taylor Meskimen, Amanda Dolan

“A lyrical and moving debut…A magical book that feels like your favorite song playing on the radio.”—Rachael Lippincott, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Five Feet Apart

A queer YA Mamma Mia! with a dash of Maureen Johnson, The Last Love Song celebrates the music of an uncertain heart—perfect for fans of Nina LaCour, Laura Taylor Namey, and Emma Lord.

After high school graduation, Mia Peters faces a summer full of painful goodbyes. Songwriting is her only solace. Everyone she knows is moving on, including Britt, her biggest supporter … and kind-of-sort-of girlfriend. Britt keeps pushing Mia to go bigger and do better than their small town, but Mia can’t imagine a life beyond Sunset Cove. Besides, she refuses to follow in the footsteps of her late mother—country music star Tori Rose—who abandoned her family to pursue her dream, leaving Mia and her two grandmothers alone.

Desperate for a sign of what might lie ahead, Mia finds the opposite—a mysterious letter from the past, addressed to her in her mother’s handwriting. It turns out to be the first of many. One by one, they lead Mia on a wild scavenger hunt through a Sunset Cove she never knew, buried under the memorializing that has frozen her mother in time. Each new discovery brings Mia closer to the real Tori Rose, but with the clock ticking on Britt’s departure, Mia knows she is running out of time.

With the summer winding down, Mia must decide if she is ready to face the present, confront her feelings, and forge the destiny she truly wants. A dazzlingly soulful debut, The Last Love Song is perfect for anyone who’s ever tried to decode the clues in the lead-up to a new Taylor Swift album.

©2024 Kalie Holford (P)2024 Blackstone Publishing

ended up enjoying it

I love stories that have music and love involved so intricately. this is a good story once you get to the end and look back. martyr characters, especially ones who are the main character, irritate me to no end. by the time I got to only one hour left I almost stopped listening because I was so sick of Mia... but, because I saw that there was a whole hour left I decided to finish, and I'm glad I did. I can't say I liked Mia but the end but character growth is my weakness and that is the promise this book makes. the writing is good and I hope to listen or read more from this author in the future. I don't recommend listening if you're in an irritable mood, it only made mine worse until the end, but do give it a chance.

For fans of roadtrips, country pop-stars and scavenge hunts

Book Review: The Last Love Song by @kalieholford
Released: April 9, 2024
Rating: 5/5
Recommended by: FYP on Instagram
The Low-Down: Young Adult. F/F romance. Bisexual MC. Light-hearted mystery. Scavenger hunt. Daughter discovering famous mother's life through her journal.

A fair warning, this book will break your heart and put it back together.

The Last Love Song follows Mia and her best friend/love interest, Britt, through an unforgettable summer of chasing down dreams and discovering lost memories. After Mia's high school graduation, she is gifted superstar Tori Rose's journal, who just happens to also be her mother. Raised by her Grandmas, Mia has spent her whole life only knowing her mother through other people's eyes. The journal sends Mia on a hunt to unravel clues that will unlock the mystery of who Tori Rose truly was and what happened to her. Can Mia find what she's looking for before she has to make the biggest decision of her life?

Together, Mia and Britt track down each clue left behind by Tori Rose. As we uncover new journal pages, we also step into alternating POVs from both Mia in the present and Tori in the past. The way the author so uniquely wrote the dual POVs, it felt like I was experiencing every emotion with Tori. I loved that the journal pages became immersive, rather than a page of the journal that Mia read to us.

I've said it before, and I'll keep saying it, I am truly a sucker for entertainment based books, probably because I myself chased the Nashville dream doing music PR. When I saw the summary for this book, I was desperate to get my hands on it.

Though it is hard to forget that The Last Love Song is Kalie Holford's debut novel, it won't be hard to forget The Last Love Song or Kalie. Also, I've never used so many post-it notes on a book before, so that should tell you a lot about how memorable this story is.

I am eagerly awaiting Kalie's next novel. Until then, I will be making everyone I know read this book.

For fans of Mamma Mia, Teen Beach Movie (had to throw this in there), A Little Bit Country, Skater Boy.