⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Reading this book helped me heal some trauma from a toxic relationship. Kat joins her college best friends to celebrate a wedding between two of them. She was so excited for her best friend, but this meant seeing the one that got away. Elijah, her ex, was sat conveniently at her table with his new fiancé. This was her worst nightmare. Her friend Tanner tried to distract her as much as possible, but it was not enough to stop her from crying herself to sleep that night and wishing she could be with Elijah. That wish was granted when she woke in her junior dorm room at Kent State. Would she be able to change the future of her relationship with Elijah?

To be honest I found it hard to get into this book. The time travel aspect was missing for a large chunk of it, and some details weren’t really given, including about the breakup. And Tanner was the only redeeming part. A flirty play boy with a heart of gold.

I adored all the Taylor Swift nods in Nicole Ryan's "The Very First Night."

Kat Marritt has always wondered what would have happened if she would have ended up with Elliot. Both at their best friend's wedding, she notices he's engaged and she's single- stuck dancing with her best friend Tanner. That night, she wonders what would happen if she could go back to their very first night they met. In the blink of an eye, Kat is back as a junior at Kent State ready to take the lead with her photography and be the best she can as a "Flash." She's also there to learn what happened with Elliott... were things truly what they seemed back when? Or will memory take her back to discover she was actually meant to be with someone else starting "that very first night?"

The Very First Night is a fast paced romance/women's fiction tale that Swifties and those enjoying some romance with heart will enjoy! While
some themes in the book were well written, I found the ending to be a bit rushed and wish the last two conflict scenes would have been edited out. I was head over heels for Kat and her other heroine since the beginning of the story and I knew they were going to end up together. Finding out how... that was the best part of flipping through the kindle pages and reading Ryan's first, but not last, book!

I liked this book a lot. In fact, at points I was loving it, and then it would be back to only looking it.

Tanner was/is too good to be true. Simple as that. Sure, she had to travel back in time to realize that but still. He's perfect. Nobody should be perfect, even in theory 2nd time around.

Kat frustrated me in her utter love and devotion to Elijah. He was clearly gross and awful, and thank goodness she figured that out. Again, the 2nd time around.

It all just seemed a little too perfect for my liking. Don't get me wrong, I love a HEA as much as the next reader, but I didn't feel there was enough real struggle with Tanner being so darned perfect.

I liked this book and would recommend it. The caveat being it's missing just a little something.

Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

Nicole kills it AGAIN! Okay if you aren't reading anything written by Nicole you are WAY missing out. I will always be so grateful to Tiktok for allowing me to find her as an author.

That said... I promised her a delightful review of The Very First Night. This book was so meaningful & resounded with me personally for various reasons. I enjoyed it so much that with tears in my eyes I DMd her on IG to let her know how moved I was.

A few things I want to share is that in my personal life I am a Wedding Photographer. The insight shared to our job was thoughtful, insightful and really honed in on what it is like for us in our businesses. What it's like for us to start as both an artist/small business. reading along to Kats journey in finding a career but also getting a buisness degree is something I personally did. So she had me in the career focus from the start. Where it resounded even more was in the overarching story of Kat and Tanner. Her story of falling in love with her friend after being in loved with his fraternity brother is EXACTLY the same story as my husband and I. We met in college while I was dating someone else (one of his brothers). We became friends, after a whole started dating, fell in love and have been married 13 years.

It truly felt a bit like my own personal story written on the pages. I was hooked to the individual character development. In love with the friendship that started between Kat and Tanner. Her relationship that was strained but grew in to more with her mom. Heartbroken over the telling of her journey with her dad. I cried for her. As a parent it was hard to read it. How any parent can do and say things to their children like that still blows me away. I was wrapped up in all the storylines. I cried happy tears during Kats healing journey in therapy & to the way the story ended.

Most of all I LOVE THE PREMISE! One wish... that two people happen to share on the same day. The journey it gives them and that it takes them on. It was creative and fun!!

I can't rave enough about this book. I loved every detail and Nicole really pours her heart and soul in to it. Leaving no stone turned over and no gap to be filled. The writing is so easy flowing, easy to follow and you really fall in love or hate with these characters. I can't wait for her next one!

Thank you to NetGalley and NRC for the eArc! I already pre-ordered a hard copy so I could keep this in my collection forever!

This was an insanely cute book. The Taylor Swift mentions were an added plus. I love how Kat worked so much on herself and really grew to love those who mattered and herself. I absolutely adore Tanner and was excited when I got to chapters in his pov. The time travel but should have been acknowledged more because it got kinda lost in the story.

Overall, I enjoyed this book. It has a great premise and character development and I liked the overall storyline, as well as the ending, but there were some issues I had which prevented me giving it 5 stars. Firstly, the fact that she’s gone back in time isn’t mentioned very frequently and at points you do forget that this isn’t just a college story. Secondly, I think she went back too soon, or that there wasn’t enough time spent in the present day, so that when characters are later introduced, you have to really think if they’ve been mentioned from the future instead of getting the satisfaction of instantly realising who they will become to Kat. I also felt that there were too many unnecessary spicy scenes in the book and a lot of them were quite similar. Finally, there was a subplot to do with Kat’s family life, and it felt strange because we don’t know if it happened in her original life or not, but there’s no obvious butterfly effect from her going back that could have triggered it, and I think this could have been done better with respect to the time travel elements. Overall though, I really enjoyed it and rated it 4.25 stars

This was a cute quick read and it was very easy to follow. There were a lot of emotions for Kat as she navigated being hurt, loved, a trying to heal, however, at no point was it overwhelming or too hard to follow.

This story is told from two POVs, which I love because it allows us to see the perspective of others in the story. Especially when one of the POVs belongs to the male lead. Jenna and Tanner were great characters as well. Jenna was a perfect best friend, willing to defend her best friend with an iron fist (literally) and Tanner is just an understanding and kind person. Everyone should have a Jenna and a Tanner in their lives.

I do think that the book could have benefited from more descriptive language to describe scenes or people, which would allow the reader to become more immersed in the story. At times I was unable to picture the scene and what was happening due to the lack of description.

I also think at times the premise of the story, of Kat going back in time, was mainly forgotten or not really mentioned again until the end. It seemed as though the first part of the story at the wedding was out of place, when followed by the rest of the story, which was written as if it was happening at the present. In the beginning of the story, it talks about how Elijah and her had broken up, but I don't believe it mentioned why, and Kat didn't seem to reflect on what had caused that break up, and how to avoid it. She just seemed pretty okay with how he was acting until she stopped being okay with it. As if she couldn't rrecognize the red flags in his behavior that she should have known about, but instead she was seeing them for the first time, not re-living the past that she had already been through with him. She should not have been shocked or confused.

I am rating this book 3 stars because while it was a fun, cute, and easy read, the time travel aspect that I had high hopes for was lost.

Thank you to Nicole Ryan, NRC Publishing, and NetGalley for the eARC of this book. This is my honest review.

This book was good, but at first I didn’t like that Kat wanted to try and get back with Elijah (when it was clear he was ab*sive). I also sometimes forgot that Kat was still in the past because it was barely mentioned.

The Very First Night by Nicole Ryan was a romance book I’m glad I can say I have read. I enjoyed how this book was Swiftie coded but even if you aren’t a Swiftie fan you’ll still be able to enjoy this book. The plot and characters were well written allowing you to really understand them. Thank you to all for allowing me to read this e-ARC!

5 stars

This is literally one of the cutest romances ever. All of the relationships in this book, both romantic and platonic, were so adorable. I loved the main characters and all of the Taylor Swift references sprinkled in throughout the book.

Thank you to NetGalley for sending me an e-ARC of this book!

I’m not entirely a fan of second-chance romances or the friends-to-lovers trope, but it is written in this book differently and I love how it was done. Kat is a loveable character and her anxiety is relatable. Plus, her growth throughout the book feels natural. The added element of her family dynamic created an extra layer to Kat and it helped develop her character. Tanner gives such golden retriever energy! I love him. The beginning of the book is fast-paced, yet it tends to drag towards the end of the book and it feels a little repetitive. I wish certain scenes were developed longer and that the time-travel aspect, meaning the future that Kat came from, was talked about more. All in all, this book had my heart melting.

The review has already been posted on my Instagram account.

I really love and enjoy books with magical realism and this one did it for me. I loved the characters, I loved Kay’s self growth and journey, I loved the romance. It was beautiful.

Loved this one! Great and fun read. Highly recommend.
Many thanks to the publisher, Netgalley, and the author for my ARC.

This book introduces us to Kat, who is a wedding photographer who is attending the wedding of her best friends from college. While at the wedding, she runs into her ex-boyfriend, Elijah, who is now engaged to another woman. Kat wishes that she could go back in time and have a second chance at their relationship, and is transported back in time to 5 years earlier, when she and Elijah met in college. I enjoyed the magical realism in this book. However, I think that some aspects of the time travel were handled a bit unrealistically. Other time loop/time travel books I've read lean heavily into the protagonist experiencing deja vu, and perhaps Nicole Ryan was trying to avoid that. But for a lot of the scenes set in Kat's past, it felt like she was almost surprised by what was happening, when she shouldn't have been at all. It was a fun and romantic read but I was expecting a bit more!

This was such a cute book!! I loved reading about the college experiences and the toxic relationships that come with it.

It was really well written and I loved the style of writing! Was a very enjoyable romance book.

I loved the writing that was smooth and impactful. The narrative is quite slow but we learn more about the character's history page after page so it's very interesting. The atmosphere is quite light even though there are some subjects that could be triggering...

Thank you NetGalley and Nicole Ryan for the ARC of “The Very First Night”!! I’ve always imagined what it’d be like to go back and do something over and this book gave me that feeling! It was written beautifully!! The universe works in mysterious ways and this felt like the perfect example

4 stars – The Very First Night by Nicole Ryan is my first by this author. It’s a good story, one we all might like to experience. It would be good to return to a point in our history and relive our life and see others for what they really are – both good and bad. We learn about Kat and Elijah’s history and watch Tanner on the sidelines. It was an easy-to-read story, interesting and you really look forward to what happens next. The only real drawback is when Kat is reliving her life, we don’t see to many flashes or skips in her memory to apply that she knows what does/could happen to her. It seems like she forgets that she is having a do-over and appears to be living it for the first time.

Overall, though, it was a good story! One I would read again and recommend to others.

A big thank you to NetGalley, NRC Publishing and Nicole Ryan for allowing me to read an ARC.

I really enjoyed this cute steamy rom com. The main character kat goes back in time to fall in love with her college ex all over agian only to switch things up and go her own way I loved this kat shows you can have anexity and go through hard times and bouts of depression but still be strong and kick ass