The Sunset Crowd - by Karin Tanabe (Paperback)

About the Book

Book Synopsis

"Irresistible, deft, sparkling...The Sunset Crowd is cool sans hangover, which makes it a perfect addition to your summer luggage." --The Washington Post

"Super juicy." --Rolling Stone

Fame. Fortune. Love. You can't have them all.

Meet LA darling Evra Scott. The daughter of an Oscar-winning director and a Brazilian bombshell actress, Evra is the city's reigning style queen. By day, she's at the helm of Sunset on Sunset, the boutique beloved by Hollywood's young and beautiful. By night, she's on the arm of Kai de la Faire, Hawaii's hottest export, and the screenwriter of the moment.

Enter Theodora Leigh. The twenty-something Paramount Pictures assistant looks like a big screen star, but her sights are firmly set behind the scenes, as she fights to become a movie producer in a town where sex and sexism sell. Theodora's got the talent and instincts, but she's not willing to wait. Luckily, getting ahead by any means necessary is LA's mantra.

Observing it all is Bea Dupont, a photographer for Rolling Stone and Vogue, who never misses the party, but always keeps to its fringes. A Manhattan blue blood turned West Coast bohemian, Bea holds Evra's Sunset crowd together. She's also Kai's oldest friend, and she's harbored a not-so-secret flame for him since they met at an elite Swiss boarding school.

But in Hollywood, no one stays on top forever. And it's not long before Theodora's unrelenting ambition sets in motion a dramatic quest for power in an industry that is as glamorous as it is duplicitous.

From Rodeo Drive to the French Riviera, Karin Tanabe's The Sunset Crowd is a tale of survival and reinvention, of faking it until you make it, and the glittering appeal of success and stardom, as it seeks to answer that timeless question―who gets to have the American dream?

Review Quotes

"Irresistible, deft, sparkling...The novel is skillfully textured with questions of art, success and identity: Who has the right to tell a story? If you succeed with one kind of story, must you tell it again and again? What is pandering? Can art and commercial success align? Do artists have social responsibilities to their audiences?...Tanabe pulls off the magic trick perfected by the best historical novelists: She crafts a suspenseful page-turner even for readers intimately familiar with the events...The Sunset Crowd is cool sans hangover, which makes it a perfect addition to your summer luggage." --The Washington Post

"Stylish." --Vanity Fair

"The Sunset Crowd is everything I want in a book--complex characters, glamorous locales, and a plot that's as smart as it is juicy. Tanabe is a master of historical fiction, and having her as my guide through the star-spangled streets of 1970s Los Angeles--and the gritty, ambitious, and gloriously real hearts of Evra, Theodora, and Bea--was better than a shopping spree on Rodeo Drive. You're going to love it." --Rachel Hawkins, New York Times bestselling author of The Wife Upstairs

"Mesmerizing...The Sunset Crowd, with its questionable motives, obscured pasts, and struggles for survival, is a brilliant portrait of 1970s glitz, glamour, and deceit." --Shelf Awareness

"Tanabe paints Bea as a strong leading lady who understands the pitfalls of Los Angeles, and she makes the characters deliciously complicated over the course of their ever-shifting allegiances. Readers will delight in this sunburst of '70s nostalgia." --Publishers Weekly

"Reading The Sunset Crowd is like being invited to a glittery party full of drama and champagne, imposters and celebrities. Karin Tanabe expertly explores friendship, ambition, power, and lust in the glamorous world of 1970s Hollywood. This is the addicting novel you're looking for--don't miss it!" --Jennifer Close, New York Times bestselling author of Girls in White Dresses

"Tanabe immerses readers in the celebrity life of 1970s Hollywood...Tanabe's dynamic, binge-worthy Hollywood novel poses the question, What are you willing to do, especially as a woman, to see your name on the big screen?" --Booklist

"Glamorous, delicious, and devious, this novel by fabulous author Karin Tanabe follows three women vying for power in Hollywood." --KatieCouric.com

"A page-turning and glamorous tale." --Zibby Mag

"Lush, mesmerizing, and absolutely enthralling, with prose as glittering as the star-studded 1970s L.A. world it deftly portrays, The Sunset Crowd had me sucked in from the first addictive page to the last. With its juicy and searing examination of female ambition and power dynamics, The Sunset Crowd is destined to become one of the hottest books of the summer. Add this to the top of your reading list!" --May Cobb, author of My Summer Darlings and The Hunting Wives

"The gloriously talented Karin Tanabe has written a deft and dazzling portrait of 1970's Hollywood. It was a time when women with ambition were in a war to survive using their talents, beauty and connections to make it. Evra, Theodora and Bea have different dreams but each wants to leave her mark in an industry whose favorite word is "next". This page turner shimmers with the possibilities of Hollywood success while aiming straight for the heart with all that is lost on the way to fame and fortune." --Adriana Trigiani, New York Times bestselling author of The Good Left Undone

"Sophisticated and beguiling, The Sunset Crowd echoes with glamour and Gatsby-esque ennui. I was riveted from beginning to end." --Susie Yang, New York Times bestselling author of White Ivy

"Your next book crush--delectable, immersive, transportive. Fans of Taylor Jenkins Reid will love The Sunset Crowd, a 1970s Hollywood fantasy so fully realized, you'll swear you were there." --Eliza Jane Brazier, author of Good Rich People

Praise for A Woman of Intelligence:

"There is so much punchy dialogue and funny-sad humor...This is a mid-20th-century period piece, but oh, how familiar it all seems." --The Washington Post

"Layered and engrossing." --Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"The kind of historical fiction you can get lost in." --PopSugar

"A smart thriller with heart...and some simmering sexual tension, too." --BookRiot

About the Author