Author: Karen Dukess
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.
Genre: Fiction
Source: Book Expo 2019

Goodreads:  A propulsive tale of ambition and romance, set in the publishing world of 1980’s New York and the timeless beaches of Cape Cod.

In the summer of 1987, 25-year-old Eve Rosen is an aspiring writer languishing in a low-level assistant job, unable to shake the shadow of growing up with her brilliant brother. With her professional ambitions floundering, Eve jumps at the chance to attend an early summer gathering at the Cape Cod home of famed New Yorker writer Henry Grey and his poet wife, Tillie. Dazzled by the guests and her burgeoning crush on the hosts’ artistic son, Eve lands a new job as Henry Grey’s research assistant and an invitation to Henry and Tillie’s exclusive and famed “Book Party”— where attendees dress as literary characters. But by the night of the party, Eve discovers uncomfortable truths about her summer entanglements and understands that the literary world she so desperately wanted to be a part of is not at all what it seems.

A page-turning, coming-of-age story, written with a lyrical sense of place and a profound appreciation for the sustaining power of books, The Last Book Party shows what happens when youth and experience collide and what it takes to find your own voice.

Ope’s Opinion: I wanted to read this book because the synopsis talked about books and the writing world.  In my opinion, there wasn’t enough about books and too much about who was sleeping with whom.  I am not, nor will I ever be a writer, so maybe coming from that perspective I missed something.

I am also a bit frustrated that “the coming of age” had to have an affair to happen.  Can’t a young woman come of age without having an affair with an older married man?

All the secrets came out at the last book party – which is why it was the last one!