Customer Reviews

At Last

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

For the first time in eight years, Manhattan veterinarian Graciela Taylor returns to her hometown of Idle Point, Maine to attend her father's latest wedding. Gracie abruptly left town by herself the night she was to elope with her beloved Noah Chase, who left shortly afterward.

To her chagrin, Noah has returned to sell off the family's newspaper. While he always wondered why she left him, Gracie thinks back to those days when her widowed father Ben hated Noah for no reason except he was a Chase; his aristocratic dad Simon loathed Gracie for no reason except perhaps because she was a Taylor. She still loves Noah though he is the father of someone else's girl and still hurts from the secret that Simon revealed to her on that fateful day.

AT LAST is an exciting romantic drama that highlights the destructive side of obsessive love on innocent future generations. Ben is a pathetic drunk and Simon seemingly in control is as emotionally as unstable as his rival is. The story line uses flashbacks to tell the tale of eight years ago, but although the technique works, readers must wonder why the intelligent and ambitious Gracie would accept Simon's word without talking to anyone else to collaborate it. Still, Barbara Bretton provides her fans with an emotional contemporary tale that hits the guts and heart with its force.

Harriet Klausner

I loved the characters in this book and the town so much
that I need to lobby Ms Bretton for a sequel!!
This is a story that grabs you from the first page and keeps you turning them until your eyes are blurry from reading too far into the wee nighttime hours. It is a perfect love story that is satisfying and believable. Turn off the tv news of the day and prepare to relax in the sweetness of this love story that Barbara Bretton so skillfully unfolds. You'll be wanting to hear of a sequel too!

At Last is an endearing love story centered around two characters that are meant to be together but have to face the fact that it's impossible for them to do so. The plot is familiar, but the author did a great job of making the readers care about Gracie and Noah. The setting was wonderful and the story got better and better as it went on. I'll be looking forward to reading more of Barbara Bretton's novels.

I just finished reading "At Last." I was iffy about it at first, but, bought it anyways. I am so glad I did. This book is wonderful from start to finish. You'll enjoy every minute with Noah and Gracie. If you've never read a book by Bretton, give her a chance. I bet you'll like her writing as much as I do. Happy reading.

I love this book, I almost cried and I never cry during a book! Truly you will love this book!!

I love this book, it almost made me cry, and pull my emotions as I thought of my boyfriend, which we have been together for over 4 and 1/2 years. This book is awesome and should be read by any true romantic!!!!!!!!!!

I loved Noah and Gracie (and Sophie) and I enjoyed this book very much. HOWEVER... There was an EWWWWW moment for me when Noah and Gracie went to bed together even though Gracie thought he was her brother. If that one episode had been left out, I could have given this book 5 stars.

Don't get me wrong. I love Bretton's books - each one takes the reader deep into her characters souls and we can feel the pain, the love, the angst, and the hurt. This book is no exception. The background and insight to Gracie's and Noah's lives was great. But once they both came back to town- the story lost what it was building - at least for me. It just seemed too pat.

And once they found each other again - and they kissed and then when they made love at Thanksgiving - I kept thinking - how can she do this -IF she believes what Noah's dad told her. Yuck! That is where I really just stopped caring what happened.

I started to read "At Last" in the plane on the way from Raleigh-Durham to Boston. I had a meeting at MIT the next morning, so I planned to go over my notes that evening in the hotel. The DoubleTree is perched right on the banks of the Charles River, and my room on the 7th floor gave me a spectacular view of the section of the city which owned the competing campuses of Harvard and MIT. My window loooked down over the glistening frozen river, which was wearing slight drifts of snow here and there. The vista was beautiful, but the clock on the art deco-looking Poloroid building visible in the swirling mists was well lit, and told me it was 10 pm. I had a lot to do,and it was getting late. BUT..., the troubled, all consuming love and pain of Gracie and Noah, would not leave my brain. I had to know if this would end well. Were the keys to unlock this turmoil, and free this powerful love in the secret held by Noah's father Simon, or his mother Ruth? I had to yield; I simply dropped my notes and dug the book out of my briefcase, and sat down to find the answers. Barbara Bretton's writing reveals her characters in such a true light that you feel you know them. You can easily feel the depth of the love and hate in this story, and Barbara won't release you easily; she draws you along with her to the end of the tale to discover its final resolution. Everyone should experience a love this strong. It is a great read, and I heartily recommend it

When I first got the book at the library, I thought it was too long for me. But when I read it, I was spellbound by the way Gracie and Noah got back together at the end of the book. They were only five and six when they met, and it was sparks when they saw each other when they were seventeen. I'm reading the book again, now that I'm in college, and I still love the book. I wish I could get it for myself!