I am grateful to Melissa Caruso, Little Brown Book Group UK, and Netgalley for the Advanced Reader Copy. What follows is my own personal and honest review of the novel to help you decide whether or not this could be your next read.

I wanted to love this book more than I actually did. It had a beautifully designed cover, and an intriguing premise to match. I loved the idea of being at a party and this party altering in some way as it plunged into different realities. Based on this alone, there is not another sci-fi fantasy novel I can think of to liken this story to. I was, therefore, extremely interested in reading something fresh and new.

Kembral Thorne is currently on maternity leave having given birth a couple of months ago. She attends a lavish New Year’s party attended by (potential) clients and colleagues with hopes of letting her hair down and having a rest from all things work i.e., motherhood, and the day job. However, when a strange clock chimes, she finds her world reset and a layer away from where she was on the previous chime in a version of her world more dangerous than the last. With different magical guilds, each with their own talents, can Kembral enlist the right team to fight an array of foes before the real world is lost forever? And in doing so, can she ensure that lives aren’t lost along the way?

Starting with what I loved, I loved the world building, and there was a lot of it. The opening party was already a lavish affair, but when the clock chimed transporting the party and all its guests to a new reality, the ball would either become more, or less, opulent depending on how many resets had occurred. Caruso worked hard to create a visual image of everything in a way akin to J. R. R. Tolkien, although she wasn’t always successful and sometimes it just felt like overkill. That said, I appreciated the sentiment and the visuals that made full sense.

Unfortunately, there was a lot to dislike. After the first few clock chimes, the plot became a bit stagnant; find and kill the enemy to save the party guests and get back to the real world. There were so many enemies taking turns that there were as many world resets to accommodate them all. After the 5th reset, I was bored. Bored of the party, bored of the Groundhog Day effect, bored of all the unnecessary secondary characters, and bored of the love hate relationship between the protagonist and her love interest, Rika Nonesuch.

I found a lot of the story became repetitive i.e., the main characters would keep referring back to an incident that saw them fall out, Kembral would repeatedly want to return home to her baby, but then decide that she had to be her true self. Less of the unnecessary repetition would have shaved a great deal from the 400 pages dedicated to this story. However, despite the repetitions, I felt the story was hard to follow. Firstly, the characters didn’t know what to expect from each world shift, so it was hard for the reader to keep up with drastic changes, secondly, the book introduced many characters early on. I understand the need for lots of people given the story is predominantly set in a ball, however, when a reader is introduced to characters, they expect them to do something. Many of the characters were merely names. As a result, I didn’t connect with any of the characters because many failed to have any depth, left me feeling disappointed, and prevented me from forming attachments with others because I was unsure early on whether they were going to be important or not.

After the first few cycles, the book felt drab, thus slowing my reading. There was talk of the different factions people belonged to i.e., hounds, cats, ravens, empyreans, echoes but they weren’t well explained. The reader has their work cut out figuring this out for themselves. I also struggled with gender; characters were either he, she, or they at random. I’m not sure the book called for more than a traditional view of gender or delivered an important message about it so it would throw me to learn that someone was a say, a ‘brother’ after several conversations that used a ‘feminine’ name to describe them. At the 50% mark, I gave up trying to make sense of it all and jumped ahead to the final 2.5 chapters. From what I gather, the story was resolved well.

Having skipped 40% of the novel, I’ll refrain from recommending the book to a specific audience. All I’ll say on this matter is that this is a long, complex story, which is drawn out. It will require a patient, adult reader to deal with the complexities and obscenities (swearing) who also likes a vibrant, intricate world.

This story is set in a complex world where our main character, Kembal, finds herself in a time loop, falling between layers of reality while trying to solve a mystery which impacts all echoes of the world. Her only ally is her greatest rival and as each loop is played out the characters and their history are fleshed out and a second chance romance unfolds alongside the mystery. It's really well done and takes the reader on a wild ride.

I was very intrigued by the premise of this book. A locked room mystery with a Groundhog Day twist and a sapphic romance sounded like just the fun read I needed right now.

Here’s what I loved:
Our main character is a young mom who is still in the throes of post partum and the mixture of struggle and joy of being a new mom is portrayed very well.
The opening chapters and first few time loops I found very fun and sparked my interest.

Unfortunately there were also quite a few things that made this story not quite work for me.
We’re straight up thrown into a party setting and meet side character after side character that I had a hard time caring about. I didn’t even care about the main character yet!
I understand that the amount of time loops made sense with the clock element but it was just too many.
I also had a hard time being invested in the romance. The dialogue felt campy and more YA than I expected from an adult novel which contributed to the lacking chemistry between the MC and her love interest.

Thanks to NetGalley and Orbit Books for providing an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review!

Thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the ARC.

What a book! I immediatly fell in love with it - with a blend of political intrigue, mystery, sci-fi and fantasy elements, delightful characters and amazing worldbuilding, it was the perfect read for me. Definite 5 stars!!

Thank you, NetGalley and LittleBrownUK, for providing me with an advance audio ARC/eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I loved it and had an amazing time reading it.
I gave it 4 stars because I didn't understand the magic system and was a little confused,  but that was on me because I didn't pay attention at the beginning.
I loved that the main character was a mom. She was constantly thinking about her baby. I am a mom too, and I felt that we were in the same boat.

Because I also got the audio version, I must say the narrator did an amazing job! I always knew who was who because they did a different voice for every character! Loved it!

P.S. OMG! I JUST FOUND OUT IT ISN'T A STANDALONE. WE GET A SECOND BOOK 🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳 YEEEYYYYY!!!!!
The story was interesting, and I can't wait to see what happens next!

On paper this book had the ability to be absolutely phenomenal, a unique and fun world, an MC who is a new mother and a sapphic romance. However, I didn’t have a phenomenal time with this book.

The first thing that stood out immediately was the worldbuilding, which honestly I disliked. You are literally thrown into the deep end (which is fine with a degree of context, but none was provided, I would have even take some info-dumps), in order to understand the world-building in this book you need to be able to just go with the flow and understand very quickly (which would make sense with a sequel, but not the first in a series). All of this, without even a glossary (note: one could have been added since, as I had an arc). This book is also so fast paced that along with the worldbuilding I don’t like, I never felt like I properly knew what was happening. Now, this could just be an arc thing but there were whole passages that I had to reread (p57 was the first time I really registered it, but I do think some of it was grammatical which could have been fixed since final publication).

I really like the concept of a new mother being the main protagonist, but honestly that was really the only thing interesting about the MC which was a bit of a  shame, also the sapphic romance was not nearly as prominently featured as I was construed into believing.

Overall I don’t think I will pick up the rest of the books in the series, but considering this is this author’s debut but the concept was so good, that I might pick something up by them later down the line if I like the idea of it.

Let me just say that I love the world building in The Last Hour Between Worlds. I love the parallel worlds to our time, the magical time spy agency, and these mystical and dangerous Echo beings. There's so much more I love that I can't even say! If you love the idea of The Umbrella Academy meets an almost Inception like feel, this is for you! Besides the world, I also adore the characters in The Last Hour Between Worlds. For Kem, not only is she dealing with the potential demolition of the world, but also what her job means to her after coming back from maternity leave. Now that she is a mother, how does she make sense of the world, the stakes, and her own actions.

Solid 3.5⭐. Thank you NetGalley and Little, Brown Book Group UK for the ARC.

I commend the story for having an interesting concept of alternate layers of reality to play with, but the time loop was literally eleven times too long. It started to drag on and on that my interest waned and I stopped caring about the (admittedly high) stakes by the final act. The highlight of this book for me was the relationship between protagonist Kembral and her rival/love interest Rika. I loved their chemistry and interactions so much that those saved me from ever getting bored.

Kembral being a single mother with a newborn was also a refreshing POV to read. I love the adjustment of outlook she needed to have--from a reckless, rush-headlong-into-danger attitude to one that's more careful with her life now that she has a child waiting for her back home. We love and support careerwomen who are steadfast in juggling motherhood and their calling in this household.

This made such a concise standalone that I was surprised to see that it is the start of a series. Would definitely return to this world and the sapphics in a heartbeat. Just less time loops, please.

Parece que este es mi año de libros con misteriosos asesinatos en habitación cerrada y un toque de viaje en tiempo, pero desde luego si me tienen tan entretenida como The Last Hour Between Worlds, no tengo derecho a quejarme.


Melissa Caruso tiene ya varias trilogías publicadas, pero por lo que sea nunca me había puesto con algún libro suyo. Así que cuando vi que se publicaba esta novela, que la verdad tenía buena pinta y tuve la oportunidad de acceder al audiolibro, no hubo más impedimentos para ponerme con ella.

La protagonista del libro es Kembral Thorne, una investigadora en un reino mágico de fantasía que está de baja maternal. Es su primera noche fuera, tras dejar a su bebé a cargo de su hermana durante unas horas para asistir a una fiesta de cotillón que se presume divertida, pero que acabará siendo un carrusel de asesinatos. Es una premisa muy interesante, pero si a esto le añadimos la capacidad de Thorne para saltar a nuevas capas de la realidad llamadas Ecos en las que pululan extrañas criaturas, la novela promete.

En primer lugar me gustaría destacar y mucho el hecho de que Kembral sea una madre primeriza reciente, con todo lo que ello conlleva. La falta de sueño, las presiones sociales por saber cuándo se volverá a incorporar al trabajo si es que lo hace, la dualidad entre ser madre y seguir siendo mujer… Me he sentido extremadamente identificada con la protagonista, incluso cuando está deseando volver a ver a su hija aunque solo sea por darle de mamar y descansar un poco de la presión de la leche en su pecho. En este sentido la novela es tremendamente realista, aunque en los demás pues siga siendo una obra fantástica muy entretenida.

En el transcurso de la fiesta Kembral descubre que todos los asistentes forman parte de un juego macabro que llevan a cabo las entidades más poderosas del mundo mágico para nombrar el año que está por llegar, lo que a su vez se aúna con las intrigas más mundanas de los gremios humanos para luchar por algo más de poder e influencia. El hecho de que el mundo a su vez se vaya desgajando en ecos más y más alejados de la realidad y por lo tanto más peligrosos, no hace si no añadir más picante e interés a la narración. Si te dejas llevar por el ritmo endiablado de los saltos entre realidades, disfrutarás muchísimo con el libro.


Por buscarle alguna pega al libro, que ya digo que es entretenidísimo, quizá sobren algunos de los planos de realidad en los que se va sumergiendo Kembral, porque se supone que más de 4 niveles de profundidad ya es de locos y ella sigue y sigue bajando hasta conseguir su objetivo. Además de algunas casualidades bastante bien traídas y convenientes para la subtrama romántica del libro, que tiene representación bisexual para nada forzada y muy creíble. Quizá suene un poco repetitivo lo cansada que está por no dormir pero es que puedo garantizar que cuando no duermes cuidando a tus hijos es algo que no se te quita de la cabeza.

Creo que podría haber funcionado perfectamente con una novela única, pero se anuncia como la primera de una saga porque la construcción de mundo es tan atractiva que dar para mucho más. No tengo duda de que leeré las siguientes entregas.

This was such a mixed bag for me. I loved the premise and couldn't wait to read it , but I struggled with it in parts. I found it really slow at times and there is a lot of world building which I enjoyed but overall something just didn't work for me and I'm not sure why.

All Detective Kembral Thorne wants is to get some time away from her two-month-old baby and go to a party. Unfortunately for her, the party turns out to be the setting for murderous-entities-that-exist-across realities' version of a fight for dominance, and she's the only one who can put an end to it - with some help from a woman she used to kind of have a thing with, but it's complicated. They work together to solve the mystery, save the day, and figure out what exactly happened between them. There's secrets, there's plot twists, and there's some very delicious prose paired with incredible imagery.

Kembral is a refreshing character in a fantasy setting, given her status as the mother of a newborn, even if she's stellar at her job. Melissa Caruso created a character who is relatable, convincingly good at what she does, and she's far from perfect in the best way possible. It's written in first person, which usually isn't my forte, but Kembral's personality shines through every word and it's a delight to read. The supporting characters, particularly Rika Nonesuch, are just as believable and realistic as Kembral herself, and so is the relationship between the two. Filled with untold truth and secrets, it's a rollercoaster of emotions for the reader as much as for Kembral. Character development was one of my favourite things about this novel and I won't shut up about it. (Even if Blair sounds like an NPC, though that was, for the record, kind of funny.)

Actually, I lied. my favourite thing was the world-building. Caruso doesn't info dump, not even one, instead feeds you just the right amount of information you need to understand what's going on and get an inkling of what's going to happen next. There's a lot of magic involved, jumping between realities, and for a narrative set in the span of about 14 hours (give or take), you get to learn a lot about the world and the people in it, including the politics, without ever feeling like you're being drowned in it. The imagery adds to it, as it's vivid enough to show you what you need to see but leaves just enough for your imagination to finish it off and, undoubtedly, make it even scarier. Every moment was like a movie playing out in my head.

As I said earlier, there are quite a few secrets, twists, and revelations. All of them are a masterpiece on how these things should be done. Some of them I guessed, others I didn't, but they were equally satisfying, made sense, and felt like what you'd been reading about for the past few hours all clicked into place. Of course, this is a series, so not everything was resolved - but it was just enough.

Everything about this novel feels like it was just the perfect measure, and came out great.

Can't wait for the sequel!

The Last Hour Between Worlds, the first book in The Echo Archives series, was such a unique and captivating story, featuring amazing characters and a setting that felt very modern and realistic but with a few fantasy elements that made it particularly delightful. It stands well as an individual book but also acts as the perfect bridge to the next one, solving the main story in a way that feels satisfying and yet leaves enough questions left answered to make you eager to pick up The Last Song Among Wolves.

It took me a while to get into this book, as I felt a bit lost for the first few chapters trying to understand the point of the story and catch the key elements of the world-building, but as soon as the plot got a bit more intriguing with new information about the “game” and a stronger focus on Rika and Kembral, it became absolutely addictive, with a constant sense of tension and brilliant twists.

Loop narratives can be a bit boring, but the fact that in this instance each time the story loops again there are tiny changes, due to the world itself getting creepier and the characters actions changing to adapt to new variables and information, truly made the difference. And the world-building itself was absolutely fascinating, from the possibilities of jumping between realities (which felt like the perfect mix between the magic of fantasy and the futuristic technology of sci-fi) to the very unique “deities”, even if it was a bit superficial – it reminded me a bit of the style of This Is How You Lose The Time War, valuing more the opportunity of giving the reader an immersive and atmospheric experience of the world and the story than instantly providing up too many details about the society and culture, and honestly it worked perfectly.

The characters were beautifully written, even the minor ones. I especially adored Kembral: she is such a true-to-life main character, and it's lovely how it is shown that even if motherhood changed her, even if she is still in the process of rediscovering who she is other than a mom, she keeps doing everything she can to live up to her moral values and ideals, just in a different and (in theory) safer ways.
On the other hand, Rika is such a sassy badass but also in desperate need of a hug, and I feel like that’s the most perfect combination for a character, hands down.

Their relationship was also so beautifully developed: there was angst, there was yearning, and it was extremely clear that they care deeply about each other even when they *allegedly* hate each other. And a certain discovery about their past made everything between them much more special, and had me giggling and screaming into my pillow… I’m so damn excited to see how their relationship will evolve in the next book.

A locked room murder mystery but the room is falling down layers of reality and the protagonist is surrounded by enemies. Clever worldbuilding, strong characters and fast pacing, with a nice rivals-to-lovers woven in. Will definitely be reading more from this author.

What a refreshing concept! Taking place in a single night at a luxurious New Year's Eve party, Kembral Thorne, a new mother wanting some time to herself, encounters trouble when guests drop dead and the place descends into another plane of reality...and she seems to be the only one aware of it.

New moms are not protagonists I see too often (at least in literature) but I'm loving it here! Kembral isn't reduced to "the mom" character. She still retains her individuality and identity outside of being a mom, with her interiority explicitly touching on maintaining some separation between her Selves. New mom-growing pains (in all senses of the word) are present and add tension, pinching the plot throughout, so it's nice to see some consistency. Her stubbornness and big heart rule her character, from her backstory to her skillsets to her actions.

Rika is a mysterious, cautious deuteragonist who added some nice quipping to lighten scenes and has the brains (and secrets) to unpack the plot. The worldbuilding is fascinating, with
The romance and atmosphere are both slow burns with the latter being deliciously and increasingly menacing as the story progresses. The villains masterminding the conflict enhance the affair, with their willingness to do whatever they can and their supernaturalness adding much thrill and colour.

An enjoyable read.

Thanks to Netgalley and Little, Brown for providing me with the e-ARC/DRC in exchange for an honest review.

3.5/5 stars

The Last Hour Between Worlds is a sapphic time loop fantasy following a reality-jumping agent as she attempts to save a room full of people trapped in a murderous game. Kembral Thorne is a Hound Guild investigator who can travel down alternate realities called Echoes in which each layer is increasingly unreal, grotesque, and deadly. On maternity leave from her job, she attends a high society party which becomes the unwitting setting of a deadly contest by god-like Echo beings called Empyreans. As the party resets and they fall deeper into each Echo layer, Kem recruits the aid of her Cat Guild rival Rika Nonesuch who recently betrayed her to foil the plot of the Empyreans.

This book takes the concept of Groundhog Day and puts it in a story that’s more This is How You Lose the Time War meets The Glass Onion. That sounds better than the book actually ends up being though. The book reads more science fiction than fantasy to me with its high concept setting, time loop, and alternate realities. It’s just a particularly fantastical science fiction with powers framed as magic instead. I thought the worldbuilding and magic system were not adequately explained enough to make any of the investigating, the revelations, or the implications feel significant. We don’t know enough to figure anything out ourselves, and we are just taken along on this looping story. There is no “aha!” moment; it’s more “oh, ok…” One thing it did do well was making the time-looping not feel tedious nor repetitive as each reset is varied and constantly progresses the story forwards.

Kem is a new single mother (2 months postpartum) and she will not let you forget it—her body isn’t the same because of her new baby, she is tired after having to take care of her new baby, she misses her new baby, she can’t put herself at risk because of her new baby. It gets annoying. And if she isn’t reminding us about her new baby, she is pining after Rika who she previously had a friendly rivalry with professional courtesy that was bordering on flirtation. While I did appreciate the history given to them, I never felt Kem and Rika’s sapphic relationship to be all that romantic on-page. I think that’s just down to me never being engaged enough with either of them to get me to care all that much.

The Last Hour Between Worlds has an intriguing concept but doesn’t realize its full potential.

*Thank you to Little, Brown Book Group UK for the eARC via NetGalley

Murder mystery ✅
Set in different layers of reality ✅
Sapphic romance between 2 rivals ✅
Solve the mystery and save the world ✅
Odd mix of Loki and Groundhog Day ✅
Fun and engaging story throughout ✅

3.5 stars.
This book is smarter than me. I'm not quite sure how to review this.
The Last Hour Between Worlds is a locked-room mystery, combined with Groundhog Day to make everything even more confusing. At the center of this mystery is a big clock, ticking away until New Year's Day.
A party, a ball, falling and drifting down into echoes of reality, getting weirder and more unpredictable the deeper it goes.

One thing I loved was that the main character is a recent (and single) mom, because it added a lot of stakes to the story, with Kembral wanting to return home to her newborn daughter. I also really liked the relationship bulding between Kembral and Rika (even though I had a hard time reading about a love interest who has the same name as my little sister).

I have to admit though, I'm not quite sure what actually happened. The different realities clashing made for some very confused reading. Furthermore, I had a hard time keeping up with the character names and how they related to the main character. I think a dramatis personae would have done a lot to clear up some of the confusion.

Set in a world where our reality is known as "Prime" and there are 11 other sub-realities under this one, each weirder and more dangerous than the last, a New Year's Eve house party is dragged into a game between immortals and mischief makers. Kem is a hound, basically a detective who investigates missing people (or dogs) that sometimes fall, or are pulled into other worlds, she goes and retrieves them. The setup for each hour of the story is the same, Kem arrives at a party, various outside forces try and enter the party and kill somebody, chaos ensues. Then the clock resets and the whole things starts again but with influences from the new world they are situated in as the entire party is dropped through layers as the clock strikes.

I loved the slow unfolding of the background of the characters and general world building that occurred over the course of a very protracted party. Although the general setup was the same, there was so much nuance and intrigue and breadcrumbs being sprinkled that made me want to keep reading to try and get to the bottom of what was going on and why.

I thought Kembral was a fantastic protagonist, it made a really nice change to see somebody over 25 being the main character and as well as being a total bad-ass at work and having rare abilities and skills, she had real life worries she was constantly dealing with. The other characters felt well fleshed out and how they interacted with each other and their various back stories being revealed was excellent.

All in all, I cannot wait for book two!

Thank you to Orbit and NetGalley for my digital review copy.

3 stars.

I did enjoy this book, but I finished it wishing there was slightly more. Don't get me wrong, I am excited to read the sequel.

We follow Kem, a new mother, who is struggling to adapt to motherhood and the changes from being a workaholic, finally have some time to herself at a New Year's Eve party.

I found the overall premise of the book to be intreguing - the same party, but it gets progressively weirder and weirder as the night goes on as we go through different Echos.

This is definitely a book I'd want to see adapted into something- maybe an animated thing for how rich the different echoes were. But I found myself wishing there was some concrete explaination to the different guilds and what moons mean. We have a lot of promise from all the different guilds, but I felt like I needed more information to be immersed.

The main relationship between Rika and Kem left me feeling like I wanted more from it. It wasn't bad, I just felt like it could be developed more.

I am looking forward to seeing where this tale goes in the next book, though and will be picking the sequel up.

I was really excited about this book, but unfortunately, I couldn't finish it. The first half felt like a massive info dump, making it hard to understand the world-building and the system in place and I also struggled to connect with the FMC's perspective on motherhood. I hope this book finds its right audience, but unfortunately it just wasn't for me.