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Hungover from just reading it

June 27th, 2008 Katharine - Sequoya

The book Diary of a South Beach Party Girl by Gwen Cooper tells the semi-autobiographical story of Rachel Baum, a Floridian native, who as a recent divorcee decides to turn life into a Studio 54 evening that never ends.  For those fans of bad girl memoirs, this one will be a fun summer read.

Rachel moves to South Beach in the 1990’s just when it is reaching its’ seedy heyday.  Parties here have names and VIP sections with complimentary bottles of champagne and lines of cocaine laid out for their guests.  The story is a whirlwind of party descriptions and name droppings of South Beach celebrity partiers.  Rachel ends up falling for one of these SoBe celebs John Hood and this love affair weaves through the book and ends quite dramatically.  Rachel’s quiet day job as an events coordinator for different non-profit groups finally becomes quite at odds with her decadent partying life style and she has to make a choice.  South Beach Party Girl or Responsible Adult?

My major complaint with this book was the repetition of party and clothing descriptions, they all started to run together.  The drunk, cocaine fueled all-night dancing stories started to get old after awhile, perhaps a good editor could have shaved some of those scenes.  Although the writing was good, the plot was like an adult Gossip Girl story at times.  I felt like I needed a stint at a rehab after finishing this one, but it was still worth the ride.

Entry Filed under: Recreational Fiction