I added The Last Romantics to my TBR list as soon as I heard it was similar to Commonwealth, one of my favorite reads from 2017.
This book is full of love. The love between friends, family and with ourselves. This family saga spans over a century of time, tracing the Skinner family who are brought together and pushed apart throughout this time period for various reasons. I dove into this book, fell in love with the characters and found myself turning the pages to see how the story will unfold over time.
I thoroughly enjoyed the prose in this book and have added The House Girl to my TBR pile, another book of Tara Conklin’s. It’s always fun to find an author you can depend on to bring you a good story consistently and from the reviews, it looks like she delivers.
About The Last Romantics
• Hardcover: 368 pages
• Publisher: William Morrow (February 5, 2019)
“Tara Conklin is a generous writer who deftly brings us into the world of this fictional family, an engrossing and vivid place where I was happy to stay. The Last Romantics is a richly observed novel, both ambitious and welcoming.” — Meg Wolitzer
The New York Times bestselling author of The House Girl explores the lives of four siblings in this ambitious and absorbing novel in the vein of Commonwealth and The Interestings.
“The greatest works of poetry, what makes each of us a poet, are the stories we tell about ourselves. We create them out of family and blood and friends and love and hate and what we’ve read and watched and witnessed. Longing and regret, illness, broken bones, broken hearts, achievements, money won and lost, palm readings and visions. We tell these stories until we believe them.”
When the renowned poet Fiona Skinner is asked about the inspiration behind her iconic work, The Love Poem, she tells her audience a story about her family and a betrayal that reverberates through time.
It begins in a big yellow house with a funeral, an iron poker, and a brief variation forever known as the Pause: a free and feral summer in a middle-class Connecticut town. Caught between the predictable life they once led and an uncertain future that stretches before them, the Skinner siblings—fierce Renee, sensitive Caroline, golden boy Joe and watchful Fiona—emerge from the Pause staunchly loyal and deeply connected. Two decades later, the siblings find themselves once again confronted with a family crisis that tests the strength of these bonds and forces them to question the life choices they’ve made and ask what, exactly, they will do for love.
A sweeping yet intimate epic about one American family, The Last Romantics is an unforgettable exploration of the ties that bind us together, the responsibilities we embrace and the duties we resent, and how we can lose—and sometimes rescue—the ones we love. A novel that pierces the heart and lingers in the mind, it is also a beautiful meditation on the power of stories—how they navigate us through difficult times, help us understand the past, and point the way toward our future.
About Tara Conklin
Tara Conklin has worked as a litigator in the New York and London offices of a corporate law firm but now devotes her time to writing fiction. She received a BA in history from Yale University, a JD from New York University School of Law, and a Master of Arts in Law and Diplomacy from the Fletcher School at Tufts University. Born in St. Croix, she grew up in Massachusetts and now lives with her family in Seattle, Washington.
Find out more about Tara at her website, and connect with her on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
*I received a copy of The Last Romantics from TLC Book Tours in exchange for an honest review. *
2 comments
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I’m so glad you loved this one! Thanks for being on the tour!
Sara @ TLC Book Tours