Book Review: "One Last Gift" by Emily Stone

Sometimes the best gifts in life are the ones you don’t expect. That's the idea behind Emily Stone's newest book following Always, In December.

After their parents died when they were young, Cassie’s older brother Tom has always looked out for her. The two of them and Sam, Tom’s best friend, have always been a trio, although as they’ve gotten older, Cassie’s feelings for Sam have complicated things a bit. And then she realizes Sam isn’t the person she thought he was.

And then tragedy strikes, leaving her more alone than ever. But when she is given an envelope with Tom’s handwriting on it—horrible handwriting she always teased him about—she realizes this is the first clue in his annual Christmas treasure hunt that he always did for her. He had promised this year’s hunt would be truly epic.

If she follows the treasure hunt Tom planned, will it bring her closer to him, or will it hurt more in the end, because it’s the last one he’ll ever do? What if she can’t even figure out the clues without him?

Cassie realizes that she’s less alone than she thought. And more than that, she realizes that Tom wouldn’t want her to live a life of grief and fear—he’d want her to pursue her dreams and never settle. But when she gets to the end of the hunt, what will be the treasure she finds?

One Last Gift is a sweet, emotional, friends-to-lovers romance about finding your way to the life you were meant to live, not the one you’re expected to. Like most romances, it’s predictable, but that’s part of the appeal. And while you expect a reasonable amount of push and pull in romances, there was a little too much of it in this book, plus one-sided miscommunication. But it still made me tear up!!