LAST LIGHT (The Night Owl Trilogy #2) by M PIERCE

♥ ♥ ♥

Reviewed by Jenny & Gitte

J&G: ✯✯✯1/2 Stars

 “He’s the golden boy, you see? We always forgive him.”

J&G:  There’s no denying it. Night Owl blew us away when we read it last year. It was addictive, passionate and emotional. We were introduced to Matt Sky; an intelligent, rather eccentric character whose actions posed many questions and ensured we hungrily flipped every page as we experienced the intensity and passion of his and Hannah’s relationship. In Night Owl we empathised with the struggles Matt underwent throughout that book and felt and understood his need for anonymity. It was real and raw. His love of his craft, his craving to turn his thoughts and imagination into stories was as important to him as breathing. But it was at a cost.

“You don’t have the fucking patent on pain, Matt. You don’t get to play the tortured genius card.”

M. Pierce’s writing was unique and even spell binding at times. So, to say we were eagerly anticipating Last Light, picking up Hannah and Matt’s story where that heart stopping cliffy left off is an understatement.

And so we delved into Last Light with much enthusiasm and were pleased to find the same metaphorically expressive prose was still evident through most of the story. We fell in love with this authors writing style and that love affair was still present on the whole in Last Light.

‘Whatever else life contains, Matt once said to me, it’s sad because it has to end.’

One of biggest drawbacks in Last Light became our feelings towards Matt. Here was a character who charmed us and who we loved in Night Owl. In that instalment we found him witty, endearing and his dirty mouth wowed us. Yes, he was high maintenance, but we empathised with him and willed him the privacy he so needed.  Sadly in Last Light Matt came across as selfish, whiny and self-centred and annoyed us to the point of distraction at times. We just couldn’t warm to him this time around as we did in Night Owl.

The shining light for us this time round were Nate and Seth, Matt’s brothers. These men completely stole our hearts. In fact, we felt more for these two than we did Matt. We felt so very, very sorry for Seth in Last Light. Here was a vulnerable and honest man who was a casualty of Matt’s game. He was a pawn and so cruelly treated. Nate had our hearts. A beautiful soul who was loyal to a fault and who, due to his uncompromising love for Matt was also a puppet in Matt’s selfishness. Yes we realise this sounds harsh, however, we have to be honest.

“Matt is a master manipulator, Hannah. And you’re not a cruel person, I can tell.”

Hannah, bless her, had our sympathy for most of this story. The young lady really came into her own in Last Light and showed great endurance and strength and we loved her for it. Although she agreed to it, we felt she was coerced into doing Matt’s bidding. It was extremely difficult on Hannah but Matt didn’t appear to shoulder any weight whatsoever and his expressions of guilt at putting Hannah through it all just didn’t feel honest. His words felt hollow and we felt Matt didn’t warrant the loyalty Hannah bestowed on him.  We felt the emotional strain on Hannah throughout the story.

“Let’s not live in the real world.”

For us this book didn’t have the impact that Night Owl did and it absolutely GUTS us to say this, especially after excitedly looking forward to Last Light. The characters voices appeared to have changed somewhat for drama’s sake; some exaggerated even since the previous book which we feel affected our enjoyment of the story and was unnecessary. At times it also felt as if the Author’s voice changed from poetic and metaphorical to almost cheesy and repetitive. It was so transparently conflicting it felt as though ‘outside voices’ were involved. This is not the Author we came to love and it’s such a shame as we LOVE this Authors unique writing. Did Last Light venture into that ‘second book filler trap’ of a trilogy? Sadly, perhaps so.

“You’re so poetic when you want to be. Are you manipulating me, or are you a hopeless romantic? I can never tell.”

We will say that one aspect of this story we found particularly fascinating and very clever was the way M Pierce intrinsically wove real life into her fiction. It had us pondering at what point did reality end and fiction begin? It certainly raised many questions and became quite the lively conversational topic for us both.

“I don’t want to be the sun in your sky. Do you get what I mean? I’m happy being the moon.”

Will we be 1clicking After Dark, the final installment,  the minute it’s live? You bet we will!  We are enjoying this series enough to be invested in these characters, wanting to see their story through to the end. Not to mention we will be craving more of M Pierce’s mesmerising and beautiful prose. We can’t wait and hope we get the M. Pierce back whose writing is so very unique and addictive. Fans of this series will devour Last Light, of that we’ve no doubt, it just didn’t completely work for us this time around.

**Reviewed off an ARC copy provided by the publisher with thanks**

 ♥ ♥ ♥

Purchase Links for THE NIGHT OWL TRILOGY here
(Our Review for Night Owl)

♥  NIGHT OWL – BOOK ONE
AMAZON US | AMAZON UK | AMAZON AU

♥  LAST LIGHT – BOOK TWO
AMAZON US | AMAZON UK | AMAZON AU

♥  AFTER DARK – BOOK THREE
Pre Order – Due for release 2015
AMAZON US | AMAZON UK | AMAZON AU