*I was sent an ARC of All-Nighter in exchange for an honest review. Thank you to HarperCollins and Cecilia Vinesse for my copy of the book*
Synopsis:
Autumn Povitsky is a high-achieving, booked and busy, straight-A nightmare. She’s currently having a crisis of self—she needs a fake ID ASAP—but because she’s a total square, she has no idea where to get one.
Enter buzzcut hottie Tara Esposito. She’s a rule breaker and party crasher of the highest degree, and if anyone knows where to get a fake, it’s her. But Tara has hung up her James Dean leather jacket for the night. If she doesn’t finish this godforsaken essay that’s already weeks late, she can kiss her upcoming graduation goodbye.
One brainy girl who needs a fake ID before sundown. One serial rebel who needs to turn in an essay before sunrise. It’s obvious what needs to happen here. But with a years-long feud keeping the girls from working together, this may be a night to forget…or one they’ll remember forever.
With razor-sharp dialogue and fiery tension perfect for fans of Becky Albertalli and Casey McQuiston, All-Nighter is a caffeine-fueled labyrinth of chaotic escapades—from prom after-parties to library séances to underground roller discos—led by two enemies who must decide if working together is better than their worlds falling apart.
Review:
All-Nighter is quite literally a wild ride. When you’re not with the characters at yet another party, you’re in a haunted inn or hiding from campus security in a supply closet. Which yes, gives you a very cliche romance moment, but you’re not entirely mad about it.
I don’t have many negatives for this book as it was pretty fun from start to finish but there were two things that did annoy me.
Firstly, I felt like I was wading through molasses with All-Nighter to begin with. I should have expected a slower pace as this book takes place across just a few hours. I actually think just making the chapters a little shorter would have helped with this. They weren’t particularly long, most were probably about 15 minutes, but my attention span isn’t great at the best of times so I did struggle to get going. I think All-Nighter would have benefited from being a little shorter to help keep the pace snappy.
Secondly, can we please stop saying a character wears glasses if you’re not going to have them wear glasses on the cover. It’s rare enough that main characters of books, especially romances, even wear glasses so it would be great to see them actually have them on in the cover art. I’m being a major nit-picker with this comment but as someone that wears glasses, it would be so great to have the main character in a romance book (which this isn’t entirely) wear glasses.
Anyway, rant over. Now onto the parts that were great, made me laugh or just outright happy. Yes, this part of the review mentions a dog.
Disney Infinity is not something I was not expecting to see referenced in a book published in 2025. Especially as the characters are only 17/18 and that game is fairly old now (I played it as a kid and I’m 26).
Any book that has a sighthound in it, a greyhound to be precise in All-Nighter, gets a tiny boost in its rating. I make the rules for my reviews and this is one I absolutely must follow now I’m a sighthound owner myself (I have a whippet that has just turned one, he’s the best). There’s a moment that mentions how the dog is sleeping with its nose pushed into its armpit in a weird position and this cracked me up as this is typical sighthound behaviour. My dog is often lying in the weirdest positions. Back to the actual book.
I was fully expecting to like either Autumn or Tara as to begin with, they felt overly stereotypical because of course the trouble maker queer teen has a shaved head and multiple face piercings and the academic lesbian wears tweed. Thankfully, they were much more than these stereotypes. Both Tara and Autumn go through a lot of character development in just one night.
The amount of antics they get up to in this one night is almost unbelievable. I can’t even comprehend pulling an all nighter anymore nevermind one that involves multiple parties, summoning a ghost and plunging into the freezing cold ocean. Yes, all of these things happen across less than 12 hours.
Overall, I’d say All-Nighter was a very good read but the pacing felt a little off at times. It does score extra points for having a greyhound though.
Check out Young Creative Press on all socials
You can also check out my StoryGraph here
Like this post? Why not read this one too: Graphic Novel Review: Turtle Bread by Kim-Joy & Alti Firmansyah
[…] Like this post? Why not read this one too: ARC Review: All-Nighter by Cecilia Vinesse […]