This is the final book of the Uptown Girls series. You can read this as a stand alone if you don't mind a few minor spoilers for the previous 2 books in the series. Best character build will be to read in order. I believe all the characters appear together in all 3 books. (This is the only one I've tried from this series, but talked with a friend as she read the first of the series)

Give this book a try if you are in the mood for
-Mixed classes – Jack was born in a brothel and is a self made man totally unwelcome in polite society, Justine is an uptown heiress
-Antiheroes – Jack is the leader of a number of criminal enterprises
-Lots of steam and f bombs ;)
-Strong themes of feminism
-Solid consent established
-A splash of enemies to lovers – in the beginning, there's some snarkiness and push back from the heroine
-A working heroine!
-Gilded age New York
-Scarred hero (not a huge part of the story)

Jack is our hero, and he's one of my favorite types. An antihero that grew up in the gutter and has more power now than anyone in town. He's drawn to Justine from the beginning. He's really rather charming. His emotions run deep, he can have a violent streak (never against the heroine), but usually he is not a brooding, grumpy character. Jack definitely is the reason I give this book 4 stars. I really enjoyed him. I love how he's so confident. He would do anything for Justine, and he helps her throughout the entire book. He's ruthless to his enemies and I love that too. What can I say, I love a man that has no problem protecting his territory and his woman.

Justine truly cares about the suffering in New York. Being a member of the Greene family, she has lived a privileged life and wants to use it to help others. Her real passion is helping the women and children of the city, with her focus being on child labor and husbands that abandon their wives. I did find these parts really interesting. Definitely makes you more thankful for the world we live in today (even though there are still issues with it). I will say Justine rather annoyed me in this book. I find I am not liking the enemies to lovers much anymore. It doesn't last long in the book, but Justine in the beginning is rather snarky and rude to Jack, and I have no idea why it attracted Jack all the more. I don't see what's attractive about it at all. Thankfully that didn't last long, but then I felt like she made quite a few decisions that had me irritated. I felt like she put herself in stupid situations and didn't take the danger of the city seriously. I also felt like she went through a complete 180 of her feelings regarding Jack and it seemed to happen repeatedly until the end of the story. But I felt surprised the first time because it really seemed to come out of nowhere.

The end of the book kind of took a dive for me as well. It seemed to have a bit excessive amount of overcoming the final hurdle. The back and forth of why they couldn't be together just went on a bit too long. Still, overall I enjoyed a LOT of this story. I give 3.5 rounded to 4.

Thanks netgalley for the ARC. All thoughts and opinions on the book are my own