The Last Year
The Survival Guide for the Kentucky Founder
This is not a hero's journey in pitch-deck form. It's a survival story.
27 chapters across 6 parts — from the 3:17 A.M. crisis call to the dot ahead. The raw story of walking away from a $200K+ salary, emergency surgeries, zero-income months, and the marriage pact that held it all together — to being named a '2026 Startup to Watch' by Louisville Business First.
Read the First Chapter"The tunnel is dark, yes. But the dot at the end still counts as light. And sometimes, walking toward it — one painful, defiant step at a time — is the whole point."
— Tim Wolter, Note to the Reader
THE KENTUCKY ECOSYSTEM
The inside story of the pivot that landed DealVue on the 2026 "Startups to Watch" list.
Why Read This?
For the ones who stay up late filling spreadsheets and fighting fears in the same breath. For the ones who make payroll and dinner happen in the same 24 hours.
Part One: The Crisis — 3:17 A.M.
It starts with an email, a cough, and a resignation. The quiet signals that your business is dying — and the brutal choices you make at 3 A.M. when nobody's watching.
Part Four: The Cost — Burn, Body, Mirror
Emergency surgery. A gallbladder that gave up. A rolling desk over the couch to code at 4 A.M. on painkillers. The bill for years of pushing too hard — and the cost no cap table captures.
Part Five: The Signal — Data Room Opens
Two fires, a byproduct, and the moment everything pivots. How the survival tools we built for ourselves became the products that earned a "Startup to Watch" nod.
The Marriage Pact — Chelsie's Preface
"I've watched this man build when he had nothing left. Two co-founders. Two parents. One mortgage we had to figure out month by month." How Tim and Chelsie separated the business from the life — and stood together in the chaos anyway.
The Arc
27 chapters. 6 parts. One year that changed everything.
The Crisis
3:17 A.M. — the email, the cough, the resignation.
How We Got Here
First dots — dance, computer lab, extortion, Oklahoma, and the thread that connected them all.
The Mission
First spark, pivot, team returns — and just wanting friends.
Cost
Burn, the body, backstop, mirror, quiet math — when the cost turns personal.
Signal
Two fires, the data room opens, second breaths, and the decision.
The Last Year
What it taught me — and the dot ahead.
About the Author
Tim Wolter is a builder, a survivor, and the founder of AvantVue. After walking away from a corporate career to build SafetyVue and DealVue, Tim navigated a brutal year of near-bankruptcy, health crises, and pivots to lead his companies to be named one of Louisville Business First's "2026 Startups to Watch."
He currently serves as an Entrepreneur in Residence at Amplify Louisville, where he helps other Kentucky founders survive the "Valley of Death." His debut book, The Last Year, is the survival guide he wishes he had when he started.
Founder Therapy Disguised as a Memoir.
See why industry leaders are calling The Last Year a mandatory survival guide.
"Brutally authentic... unlike anything I've seen in the startup world. I meant to skim it, but despite being buried in my own work, I kept reading straight past page 30."
Vance VanDrake
Author of The Patent Game
"It reads like the kind of therapy founders wish they had access to. Tim captures the emotional weight and the private chaos of entrepreneurship with startling clarity."
Laura Kenning
Director of Operations, Amplify Louisville
"A very human look into the behind-the-scenes reality of what an entrepreneur with a family actually goes through. Raw, honest, and incredibly easy to read."
Peyman Shahmirzadi
COO, Peachscore
Start Reading Now.
The first chapter is available today. The full book is coming March 2026.
Read the First Chapter