Dinner Party

I read this book in early 2022 when it came out in Ireland and I was blown away. Meg Mason is right to call this book stunning - I couldn't put it down once I started it. I stayed up way past my bedtime to finish reading it and the tiredness the next day was well worth it.

Kate is not well. She looks well, her life looks like it's a good one from the outside but we all know that's a lie. The story goes back and forth between now and 1990s, introducing us to Kate's life and family. Yes, this book does include a dysfunctional family and it's one of the best portrayals I've ever read. Though it may seem like it's starting slowly, with every page you will be pulled further and further in until, like Kate, it unravels completely.

I've recommended this to several patrons in the library and they all said they were glad to have read it.

And big hup for county Carlow representation! ;)

I enjoyed this book and it was a nice, easy read for me. The author has produced a well-written story which at times was enticing and engrossing. The story provided some real-life, down-to-earth themes which can be relatable to most readers.

I felt some areas of the book were slower than others, however, I would recommend this to fellow readers!

Kate has taught herself to be careful, to be meticulous.  

To mark the anniversary of a death in the family, she plans a dinner party - from the fancy table settings to the perfect Baked Alaska waiting in the freezer. Yet by the end of the night, old tensions have flared, the guests have fled, and Kate is spinning out of control.  

But all we have is ourselves, her father once said, all we have is family. 

Set between the 1990s and the present day, from a farmhouse in Carlow to Trinity College, Dublin, Dinner Party is a dark, sharply observed debut told with sharp, elegant humour that thrillingly unravels into family secrets and tragedy.


This an amazing debut told in the third POV we follow Kate and her family passing though time from the present to the past as they struggle on with life after loss and trauma. It is effortless in how it passes though decades back and forth to tell Kate and her families story now and then, with the pasts impact showing clear in the present.

This a character lead novel with true heart, there wasn’t a character I didn’t feel for at least once in the novel, even the toxic “mammy” there is real darker early Marian Keyes feel to the book. It is full of Irish sayings, quirks and characters that add subtle humour to what is quite a dark story about how we pay for the mistakes of our parents make, how we deal with grief it’s lasting effect and how we judge people by outdated standards.

I never once felt bored, annoyed at the self pity of the characters and while very much a character lead novel the plot stand along side this as engrossing and holds your interest, I was rooting for these characters at the same time wanting to know where the story was leading , what had happened in the past and what the conclusion would be.

I was wary at first this would be another Sally Rooney type book, which for me are overrated self indulgent tosh, but this is the book Rooney wished she could write.
This was a pre approved read on my dashboard in all honesty I wouldn’t have requested this book after reading the synopsis as I had Rooney fear so I am so glad I was pre approves cause I would have missed out on what is amazing family sage and all it’s messiness .
If you feel the same as me gives this a try because it a four strong star read any day of the week. REQUEST NOW OR BUY NOW

This a harrowing but beautifully written with elegance, humour and intelligence. It is very touching. In particular I found how the author portrays the relationships between the sibling well managed and very true to life showing all nuances these love hate relationships contain.

A lot of the main action takes place off the page you only hear of it in massing remarks and subtle interweaving, this works really well and for me really allowed the reader a more insightful look into Kate in particular character arc. There is at times however I would have liked a little more background and detail but as I say in the most it works brilliantly. The author often hints at something without much detail only for it to followed up later on this was a good way of holding interest though out the novel.

The book reminds of book I read last year by Claire Powell where all the chapter/main sections centre round a meal, this like the book by Powell was a very clever way of demonstrating family life it really does centre round the table.

It is more relevant here given Kate’s struggle with an eating disorder. The author shows real class, care, empathy and understanding of ED’s in how she writes about this, without getting into too much detail she manages to give a realistic portrayal and while it times this could be trigging for some I felt it was written very well. The afternoon tea scone scene expertly shows how the simplest gestures/comments that come from our own issues said to a child can have lasting damage.

I hope haven’t made the review sound the book was doom and gloom because it very much was not the case, it was full of humour and touching moments with for me a perfect ending that wasn’t quite a prefect fairy tale ending. I also love the nod to the 90’s and early 00’s.

Fans of Marian Keyes earlier work,Clare Keegan and Lucy Cadwell will love this.

Highly recommended- strong characters, insightful, engrossing, witty and moving-

On a foot note I had forgotten all about basked Alaska as a pudding till I seen the cover and read this book… I have never wanted one more

Dinner Party by Sarah Gilmartin is a family drama that begins with a disastrous family reunion dinner,minus her mother, organised by hostess Kate to celebrate the life of her twin sister on the anniversary of her death. With her brothers and sister-in-law bickering and sniping at each other an already fragile Kate is overwhelmed as her meticulous planning goes to waste.
From there the book goes back to Kate's childhood in rural Ireland ,the feuding brothers, the controlling mother not averse to physically or verbally lashing out at her children, the father more interested in his farm than his wife and not least the bond between her and her twin sister, who as a teenager becomes increasingly distant before disaster strikes and Kate begins to unravel.
I don't know if any of this book is autobiographical but Sarah Gilmartin lays open Kate's struggles and frequent dysfunction in a moving and often disturbing way.
The book is slow moving but beautifully written, I did fear at one point that the whole thing might be a catalogue of misery and misfortune but I ended it feeling quite uplifted.
A great piece of writing.

4 stars!

I’ve seen a lot of reviews stating that it was a slow paced book, I don’t disagree, but it did keep my interest until the end.

The book follows a dysfunctional family from the 1990’s to present in the eyes of the main character Kate. I really enjoy when books have multiple timelines.

Overall, I found this book very enjoyable and thought it was a great debut for Sarah Gilmartin! If you're put off by the other reviews, I would recommend giving this one a chance. It was very enjoyable, and I found some parts to be relatable.

Thank you NetGalley for this advanced ready copy in exchange for my honest review.

"si no cambiamos, no crecemos; si no crecemos no estamos vivos. if we don’t change, we don’t grow; if we don’t grow, we are not alive."

thank you to netgalley and the publisher for an arc of this wonderful book!

sarah gilmartin's "dinner party" is a nonlinear telling of a family coping with death and grief. we follow kate, who lost her twin sister, elaine, in a tragic accident in her youth. kate is trying to rebuild the relationships with her two living siblings and her overbearing, toxic mother while dealing with an eating disorder. food is the method of healing, each chapter revolves around a particular meal. kate is eager to please, and does everything her mother wants despite her constant disappointment in all of her children; ray who moves to america and abandons the family farm, and peter who she finds to be useless.

this charming novel is enhanced by its nonlinear form. we visit kate throughout various points in her life and see her struggle with an eating disorder and her mental health, as well as interact with food as a form of comfort. it was truly a wonderful read, with natural, fast paced dialogue and a deep dive into the characters' psyches. the descriptions are rich, and the emotions are heavy. the end, however, did not hold enough resolution for me. grief affects everyone differently, and yet it doesn't ever truly go away. this extremely dysfunctional family was a pleasure to get to know.

"Dinner Party” delves into the complexities of family dynamics with pitch dark humor. Kate, hosting a party to commemorate the death of her twin sister, struggles to control the tensions that permeate her family gathering. Told in two timelines the novel builds in intensity as it reaches the end culminating in a last third that is impossible to stop reading.

Have you ever had a little ‘pluck’ in a piece of clothing and pulled it? Yeah, bet you wished you’d left it alone, right?! Over dinner at the farmhouse one Hallowe’en, the ‘pluck’ gets pulled on the fibres of this Irish family and it slowly unravels.

Family dinners in our home are more than just the food. True, it’s always anticipated and always enjoyed. But it’s also about the conversations around the table. It’s about supporting each other as a family as we all get to understand each other better. It’s no different for the Gleeson family.

Meals are a big part of this family’s life. In each of the six sections in the book, Gilmartin features food and readers become aware of the different relationships each has with food. For some, it brings them together and for others, it’s a source of repulsion.

You would think that a party would suggest a celebration, but this family gets together every year on the anniversary of a death in the family. It’s an emotionally filled meal and the setting is ripe for discord. Gilmartin writes to explore what happens when the guests leave, and the festivities are over….and it’s no cause for a celebration. The Gleeson family is coming apart at the seams. What’s uncovered after the dinner party are the dishes of denial, trauma, family disagreements, mental health issues, eating disorders, and loss.

This book is about family and the role it plays in supporting each member. Most Irish families are centered around the matriarch and Gilmartin uses this to her advantage. Bernadette Gleeson is a force to be reckoned with and her ‘charm’ sets off different reactions within the family….all of which reach an explosive point after dinner one Hallowe’en evening.
This is an extremely well-written character-driven novel that deals with big issues in a dysfunctional family, but it’s presented with such authenticity and leaves readers with a glimmer of hope. I just wanted to give Kate a big hug, twirl her around and point her in the right direction.

The cover is excellent and best understood after finishing the book.

I was gifted this copy by Pushkin Press and NetGalley and was under no obligation to provide a review.

A thoroughly beautiful and heart wrenching family saga exploring loss, and family dynamics can impact across entire lives. Subtle humour plays out across the inherent sadness of the story which made it very engaging for me. This is a quiet novel, no fast paced plots, just beautifully drawn and complex characters and their nuanced relationships to each other. A wonderful read, a very special novel.

I absolutely loved reading this book. I was completely drawn into the topic and could not stop reading it.

I really do love a book that centers around a dysfunctional family! We follow the events of Kate as she plans a (disastrous) dinner party on the anniversary of her twin sister's death; weaving through the past and present, we explore the family's reaction to their grief and loss. This is very much a multi-layered character driven novel. The captivating prose and craft in which the author feeds information held my interest throughout. Overall, a beautifully written and moving novel. I look forward to reading more from the author.

Such a good book! Loved it and can’t wait to read another book by this author! Highly recommend it to others!

This is a slow burn and very psychological and interior. If you are expecting ordinary women’s/family fiction, you won’t find it here, but if you buckle in and go along for ride, it’s worth it.

This page turner is dripping with family drama and I just couldn't get enough. Wonderful writing and characters, can't wait to read more from Sarah Gilmartin.
I just reviewed Dinner Party by Sarah Gilmartin. #DinnerParty #NetGalley
[NetGalley URL

This family drama is Irish writer Sarah Gilmartin's debut novel, a forensic examination of family dysfunctions, the push and pull factors, that begins in Dublin with Kate Gleeson holding the eponymous dinner party in 2018 on Halloween, dwelling on a broken relationship. This is no ordinary small family dinner party, it's the anniversary of Kate's twin sister, Elaine's death as a teenager, attending is her older brother Peter, now running the family farm in rural Carlow, and her other more independent brother, Ray, with his wife. As matters unravel for Kate, we are plunged into a narrative that goes back and forth in time from 1999 to the present, family history that includes covering childhood issues that are to have troubling repercussions through the years that come, the tragedies, and the traumas.

We learn of the more introvert farmer father in comparison to the more volatile, demanding, tempermental, and abusive mother, Bernadette, a woman who insisted on being the central focus of the family. The mother guides them towards differentiating themselves from each other, overtly favoured Elaine, the more extrovert twin, we are given insightful glimpses of the family such as the Trinity College university period. We get a real feel for the sensitivities, tensions, resentments and silence that mark the Gleesons, like so many families, they know each other well, so familiar yet simultaneously unknown too, close yet distant, loving relationships peppered with exasperation. As is apparent at the fraught dinner party, there is an increasing emergence of Kate's vulnerabilities, her disturbing relationship with food, the eating disorder that is rooted in her deeply buried traumas.

There is a follow up dinner party in 2019, a more cathartic affair with many truths finally being aired openly. This is a engaging character driven, non linear Irish debut that will appeal to readers interested in the nature of families, the core structure around which society is built, its potential strengths and frailties, the secrets and silences, the heartbreaks, the traumas, tragedies, grief and a particular mother-daughter relationship. Many thanks to the publisher for a review copy.

I love a story about a dysfunctional family! Definitely on the slower side but that's to be expected in a character-driven story like this one. I'd agree with others that at times, the main character's decisions were frustrating to read about but also, the more you learned about their upbringing and family, the more it made sense. Overall, would recommend to anyone who loves to read about family drama (with a caveat to check out some content warnings before starting).

This book is beautiful in its sorrow and heartbreak as we feel for a dysfunctional family that has everyone's best interests at heart...but often don't recognize how to show or deal with genuine emotion! Kate and Elaine are twins and as close as sisters can be until tragedy strikes. We see them through time, from the 1990's to the present as they cope with siblings, death, jealousy, and their mother with her idiosyncrasies but devout love for her family and its hardships. I laughed, I cried, I kept hoping time would heal them. But we've all known sorrow, and love, and secrets we must hide. I can't wait to read more of Gilmartin in the future!
Thanks to NetGalley for this ARC!

This was a heart-wrenching story that explores loss and family dynamics and the ripples they can create across a person's life. It follows a classic Irish family who would rather bury their sadness than be open and vulnerable. This novel incorporates a delicate blend of sadness and humor that kept me engaged throughout. The story is not fast-paced, but rather relies on complex characters and the intricacies of their relationships to drive it forward. I found this to be a very touching read though slow at points. I look forward to reading what Sarah Gilmartin has next!

I was gifted this copy by Pushkin Press and NetGalley and was under no obligation to provide a review.

A story about the dysfunctional family told over multiple timelines. I enjoyed this book and could relate to small town Ireland. I read this in a day and while it is a slow burn of a novel, I found it hard to put down and enjoyed it hugely. Looking forward to whatever comes next from Sarah.

The kind of story that tugged your heart.
It was a slow-pace kind of story and it will probably reach out to you once you’re half through the book but it was all worth it. I really like that the author gave us Kate’s point of view in an intimate way and that helped us to cheer for her character development. And the end if the story, I feel glad. Cheers to Kate and The Gleesons.

Dinner Party tells the story of Kate Gleeson and her family. We meet them at their annual dinner party where they celebrate the life of Elaine, Kate's twin who died in her teens. The dinner party was hosted by Kate, who, we learn, is struggling with an eating disorder, alcoholism, and a seemingly-meaningless life. Her brothers are concerned.

Then the story takes us back to a time when the Gleesons were an intact yet dysfunctional family. Mother Bernadette is a very troubled woman who terrorizes her children and pitches fights with her husband, a farmer who doesn't seem able to stand up to his wife and hides in his work on the farm.
Then we watch them lose their father and Kate's twin sister. All four have to get on with their lives.
After the death of her twin sister, Kate comes unraveled. We follow her to Trinity College and an unfulfilling job in Dublin.

The narrative goes back and forth between Kate's life in Dublin in 2018-19, her earlier life on the farm, and her college years. I found this going back and forth a bit confusing at times. The subtle and slow narrative style makes it difficult to figure out what's going on at times. It seems like Gilmartin is inviting the reader to feel the confusion, anguish, and pain of grief, whether it be in a dysfunctional family, alcoholism, an eating disorder, or a seemingly-meaningless life.
The story ends on a more positive note, after one more disastrous dinner party where all five members of the Gleeson family quarrel, speak up for themselves, and appear to be making some progress.

The book is well-written and deals with important issues that plague many families. I would recommend this book to readers who enjoy slower reads that deal with the nature of families and the issues that plague us in life.

Thank you to Pushkin Press and Netgalley for the digital ARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

I was drawn right into this book a delicious family drama I could not stop reading.Sarah Gilmartin writes so well her characters come alive.Will be recommending Dinner Party and looking forward to more books by her.#netgalley #thread

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/5324593132?book_show_action=false

Kate has a problem, a problem she is in denial of. After a family dinner on the anniversary of her sisters death she spirals.

A slow but powerful page turner exploring family dynamics in all their dysfunctional glory. I devoured this in two sittings.

Stick with this one, it’s beautiful.

Thank you to Netgally for an ARC copy of this book.

I loved this book! It really had everything I look for- family drama, love, happiness and some grit. The writing was wonderful. Highly recommend.

BOOK REVIEW

⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Dinner Party by Sarah GIilmartin

This is a story about Kate Gleeson who grew up in a dysfunctional Irish family, where tradition and concern about what people think are important especially to her mother.

The story is told at separate points in Kate’s life and alternates between timelines. The central theme is the trauma associated with the unexpected death of two seperate family members over several years and the associated and unimaginable loss and grief. It also deals with her complex relationship with her mother and her lifelong battle with an eating disorder.

Kate’s mother has significant mental health issues. She resents being a wife, mother of 4 children and home-maker. She has a classic “victim” type personality. Her frustration often manifests into uncontrollable rage and violence. A most unlikeable woman. However towards the end of the book, the reader does start to soften toward her.

This novel deals with the trauma and tragedy that besets the Gleeson family and it’s many and varied consequences.

The characters are complicated, but the reader is asked to find some empathy and compassion for their complexities.

It all starts (and ends) with a dinner party. The development and growth of the characters keeps the reader enticed.

I really enjoyed this debut novel by Sarah Gilmartin. I liken her style to Marian Keys or Australian author, Liane Moriarty.

Thanks to @netgalley @pushkin_press and #sarahgilmartin for a gifted copy in exchange for an honest review.

#dinnerparty #sarahgilmartin #pushkinpress #netgalley #family #familydynamics #trauma #grief #loss #eatingdisorders #mentalhealth #booklover #lifasabooklover #bibliophile #bookstagram #booksofinstagram

This was my first book to read by Sarah Gilmartin. I loved the Irish setting of the book. Some of the characters were easy to identify with. The book is about an Irish family that is full of all types of everyday messiness of modern family life. The book deals with family secrets and tragedy and shows how each one deals with it. The book is very well written and easy to get lost in the pages.

I enjoyed this book. It was a little slow reading at times, but definitely worth the read. A dysfunctional family, one that pretty much anyone can relate to in some way or another. Takes place over the years, 1990's to the present day.

DINNER time can be fraught with misunderstandings, misinterpretations and missed opportunities. Be it a child refusing to eat the meal their parent made under pressure, a guest turning their nose up at the choice of starter, the sound of the doorbell an unwelcome interruption during desert, who knows what’s going to happen when a group sits down to break bread together.
Kate, who is in her early-30s, has invited her two older brothers and sister-in-law to her Dublin flat for dinner on Halloween night, to mark the 16th anniversary of her twin sister Elaine’s death. The mood isn’t downbeat; enough time has passed to mark their sister’s anniversary not with sadness, but with fondness.
That is, at least, on the surface. Kate is wound tight, and as the evening progresses old demons begin to surface. When the time comes to serve the third course, a baked Alaska slaved over during the afternoon, instead of presenting it with pride, she tips it into the kitchen bin. The party soon disperses after that, with her brothers seemingly none the wiser about her breakdown.
The scene then shifts to the family’s earlier years in Carlow, Elaine still alive, two parents present, an enviable farmhouse home in which they’re based. This is also when we meet Mammy, who had been alluded to as “undiagnosed” at the dinner party, and who at once becomes a fearsome, if sympathetic character.
The matriarch rules the roost with her moods. Sometimes she takes to her bed for days until she abruptly returns to the daily running of life, pushing her children to do their best, be it get top points in the state exams, pair up with a suitable young woman or win top prize at the horse show. Her form can shift from one minute to the next – when she is good she is very, very good but when she is bad she is awful.
The siblings’ father is slightly older than his wife, usually mild-mannered amongst his well-loved children and hard-working on the large farm he owns. From time to time there are blazing arguments with his “difficult” wife, which more often than not fizzle out from a tussle into an embrace.
Kate is the less dynamic of the twins; although their interests align, they have been encouraged to distinguish themselves by excelling in separate disciplines, quite Kate musically, with the piano and determined Elaine in the horse world. Their brothers are a few years older, itching to escape into the wide world, and as they do they take risks by treading ever less softly around their volatile mother.
When two tragedies strike within a few short years of each other, none of the remaining siblings emerges from them unscathed, but it is Kate we follow, and Kate we see losing herself to risky behaviour when she reaches Trinity College, as well as a decline into disordered eating, a way, we surmise, of regaining control over her life.
This is really cleverly and effectively rendered by debut author Sarah Gilmartin, who not only bookends her engaging, empathetic first novel with two dinner parties, but includes food as an ever present, almost menacing additional character in each of the segments covered, including a hideously disastrous drunken encounter with Kate’s married lover, and a discussion about candy-floss at an ill-fated gymkhana.
Like many other reviewers, I can’t not reference Anne Enright as a favourable comparison to this accomplished, well-observed, heart-breaking book, with the multi-layered family relationships so meticulously realised in all their horrifying, uncomfortable, loving detail.

This is an immersive story about a messy Irish family, their losses and grief and how it passes down generations. I found the pace a bit slow at the start and also at the end, but the middle section of the book is where the magic truly happens. Loved the authenticity of the characters!

Throwing a dinner party for the anniversary of her twin sister’s death causes Kate Gleason and her siblings to look back on how the death, events leading up to it and their emotionally manipulative mother has impacted on their life paths.

This book is a harrowing and emotional read in places, darkly humourous in others. This is a reminder that families are complex and relationships are nuanced. Especially around the turning of different ways of life, death and grief and past traumas.
I enjoyed the pacing of the story and felt that the character development and the delving into the past helped me to shape the plot and how I related to the characters. This book has a well thought out plot and is cleverly nuanced.

This is SUCH a good read, I loved every minute of it and I loved the family.. Kate is so relatable and I loved her. It follows her family and their backstories, I don't want to say much more as I don;t want to spoil it but I can;t wait for more from her.

Dinner Party is a story of family, death, grief, addiction, mental health, and so much more. The main character's twin sister died tragically when they were teens and the book begins 16 years later at a dinner party in observance of that anniversary.  At the core (or, I should say, as the bookends) is one dinner party in particular that is seemingly innocuous in events, but that really eats away at the main character, Kate's, subconscious. I love how the structure of this book seems to be built around how one bad night can make sure hyper-aware of all the things you've ever done wrong in your life.  

(The only thing that threw me was that I thought we were jumping into a flashback and I was not expecting the majority of the book to take place in the past.)

There's a moment in the first section, Kate & her siblings have been talking ill of their mother and Kate "reminded herself that her mother was down in Carlow, bothering no one." I can't think of a better way to put into words the guilt that comes with talking about someone behind their back. But as the story unfolds, we learn that their mother was emotionally (and many times physically) abusive. And this thought from Kate holds even more weight, just one of many times the siblings share in this belief that their mom can't help it, she doesn't mean to be the way she is. 

Throughout the book, we readers get to see many of the interactions with the mother. And they are such frustrating moments when you have someone who is doing terrible, unforgivable things, but they are convinced that they are in the wrong. There's no reasoning, there's no compromise, there are just words that spin and spin and spin until she runs out of steam and changes the subject. And every one of these scenes is just so well-written. 

And this is not just a story about these siblings and their mother; this is a story about family. And in all of these scenes, there are a least 3 other things happening at the same time, a wonderful chaos that signifies a well-written, realistic story.

Another concept that I think is so well done in this book is seeing through Kate's eyes what it's like to see her twin become a completely different person from her. Long before Elaine's death, Kate was struggling with her twin identity; they looked identical, but they had different hobbies, different interests, and different ways of dealing with their mother.

Sarah Gilmartin's Dinner Party is being released in March in the U.S. (and has already been released in Ireland). I read an advanced copy through #netgalley -- It was my first NetGalley read and I am so glad to have started on such a great note!

I enjoyed the complexities of the family dynamic and the way this novel carefully unravelled the interconnecting relationships. There were times when I felt the energy of the plot got lost, but the characters were always vivid and wonderfully observed,

Wow. I was actually really surprised at how much I liked this one. I was expecting good, but this was brilliant.

An intriguing tale of a deeply dysfunctional family which gathers on Halloween to celebrate the life of one of them. Kate's twin Elaine died mysteriously (it will be revealed) and she's never been the same. This moves around in time and place to tell her story as well as that of her siblings Ray and Peter. They have a horrible mother who turns on Ray's wife Liz at Kate's dinner party. This plot might not be fresh but the atmospherics are well done and I liked the setting. Thanks to the publisher for the ARC.

DInner Party was a novel set in Ireland in the 90’s and the present, a family drama of toxic mother’s, the death of a sibling and the ways we cope to survive the emotional turmoils of our family.

Kate is throwing a dinner party to remember the death of her twin sister. She has invited her family for what she hopes will be a nice dinner for remembering those gone and to connect as a family. Everything goes awry. The novel then take the reader through different eras in Kate;s life and how she learns to cope with the trauma of her twin’s death and her toxic family life.

I enjoyed this novel and would recommend this for fans of Patricia Scanlan or Erica James

Thanks to Netgalley, Pushkini Press and the author for the chance to read and review this books

A brutally confronting, melancholic tale of the ordeals of a muddled, dysfunctional Irish family headed by a dominating, intimidating, matriarch. The story revolves around Kate and how she battles with her personal demons following the death of her twin sister. It’s a sadly too-true-to-life narrative of the ordeals and coping mechanisms of family members torn apart by anguish and loss and the hand they’ve been dealt. Yet despite the oppressive tone of despondence, hope springs eternal.

An excellent debut by Gilmartin.

My thanks to Pushkin Press and NetGalley for granting this e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This book wasn't what I was expecting from the title or blurb so I sadly don't think I enjoyed it as much as I should have done because I was left a bit confused where the book was going. Having finished it I can say it was a great book, it was beautifully written, I'd definitely read more of Sarah Gilmartin's books, and I found the story interesting and each character well-developed. But sadly for me it had seemed like the book was going to be a mystery and I kept waiting for the mystery element to come and wondering when the secrets would start coming out. I definitely would have enjoyed it more had I realised going into it to expect a story of a family coping with loss and other issues through the ages and how it affected each of them.
My only complaint about the actual content of the book would be the lack of chapters. It was split into sections with the different timelines but some of those were rather long and there were points within it that could have been split into chapters to make it easier to find a stopping place while reading. Other than that though the story was beautiful and I loved it, I just think the blurb could perhaps be a bit clearer about what to expect.

The Dinner Party, by Sarah Gilmartin, is a beautifully written character study of how tragedy and dysfunction affect each of the children in the Gleeson family, particularly Kate Gleeson, whose twin sister dies suddenly and unexpectedly at the age of 16. It is a story that examines how family dynamics affect perceptions of ourselves and our experiences through adulthood. It questions how famial bonds can continue to grow and strengthen despite childhood trauma and constant emotional volatility.

It is a thought-provoking book that would be Iead to interesting discussions for any book club. Thank you you NetGalley and Penguin Random House for the ARC.

To mark the anniversary of a death in the family, Kate meticulously plans a dinner party - from the fancy table setting to the perfect baked alaska waiting in the freezer. But by the end of the night, old tensions have flared, the guests are gone, and Kate is spinning out of control.

Set between from the 1990s and the present day, from Carlow to Dublin, the family farmhouse to Trinity College, Dinner Party is a beautifully observed, dark and twisty novel that thrillingly unravels into family secrets and tragedy.

Haunting and unforgettable, it explores how the past informs the present, the inevitability of childhood damage resurfacing in later life - and yet how, despite everything, we can't help returning home.

I have never related to a book so much before. I get it with the dysfunctional family. This was my first and not last read by Sarah Gilmartin. Really enjoyed the story and cannot wait to read more.

EXCERPT: She burst into tears again. It was the loneliest she had felt in a very long time. Four and a half years of trying to pretend she was okay. She squeezed her eyes shut as the memories unloaded. The white oak coffin, how her mother had screamed the house down when it arrived with the wrong type of handles. The busyness of Cranavon, so much busier than her father's funeral, as if there was a rule: the younger the person, the bigger the crowd. Everyone had kept saying that Elaine looked exactly like herself, which wasn't true at all. There was so little of her sister in the waxy face and pale lips, in the slightness of her shape, the way her body seemed to be eaten up by the folds of white satin. There was no trace of Elaine's vivacity. If anything, Kate saw herself in the coffin. And she was not the only one to notice this. One night, not long after the funeral, Kate had woken up to find her mother in Elaine's bed. Barely a metre away, her eyes boring into Kate, pinning her to the mattress. Because it was her fault she was alive. Her mother had never said it, or maybe she had said it once in a fit and then taken it back, but either way, she was right. The wrong twin had died.

ABOUT 'DINNER PARTY: A TRAGEDY': Kate has taught herself to be careful, to be meticulous.

To mark the anniversary of a death in the family, she plans a dinner party – from the fancy table settings to the perfect Baked Alaska waiting in the freezer. Yet by the end of the night, old tensions have flared, the guests have fled, and Kate is spinning out of control.

But all we have is ourselves, her father once said, all we have is family.

MY THOUGHTS: There is plenty of dark humour in Dinner Party to offset the tragedies, the sadness. This is a messy family, one that revolves around the matriarch, Bernadette, and her erratic behaviour.

Bernadette needs to be the centre of attention; she needs to be not merely the best at everything whether it be scone baking or championing her daughter's horse-riding career, but to be KNOWN to be the best. She cannot stand to lose at anything, not an argument nor a tennis match. She can be cruel and vindictive, and often is. Challenge her at your peril.

Kate, even though the older twin by some six minutes, is used to coming off second best when compared to her fraternal twin, Elaine. Elaine is somehow more vivacious, more beautiful, and gets away with a lot more with her mother than Kate. Elaine understands how to both play her mother's game, and play her mother. Kate feels like a paler copy of her sister, a shadow, the negative of the photo. This feeling only intensifies after Elaine's death.

But it is when Kate leaves home for university that the real trouble begins. Instead of the freedom she expected to feel, life becomes even more complicated.

Set between the 1990s and the present day, the entire book is narrated from Kate's point of view. The writing is dark, yet witty, as Kate's life unravels and family secrets are revealed.

I both enjoyed and was unsettled by this read. Bernadette and my mother had a great deal in common.

⭐⭐⭐.5

#Dinner Party #NetGalley

I: #SarahGilmartin @pushkin_press

T: @sarahgbooks @PushkinPress

#contemporaryfiction #family drama # irishfiction #mentalhealth #sliceoflife

THE AUTHOR: After completing a BA in English and German, she completed a master’s in journalism, “mainly because I loved writing and thought this would be a way to continue”.
She got her start working for a public affairs magazine, followed by a business and finance magazine. She travelled quite a bit in her 20s, and even did a stint in the bank – “probably the most secure job I ever had, like, a grown-up job”.

But even job security couldn’t shake the bug out of her system. She needed to go back to her “first degree and first love”, fiction.

In 2011, she left the bank and began writing a novel. She spent three years writing, but ultimately, the book didn’t get picked up by publishers.

“That was tough. It felt, at the time, you know, what am I doing? Maybe I need to go back to the bank or give up on this.”

She turned her focus to arts journalism. She had been publishing reviews here and there, so she built on this.

“But then every so often I’d have an idea for a story and I’d start tipping away,” she says. Gilmartin then applied to do an MFA at UCD. “I decided kind of in a rush I was going to do it. And from that point on, things have taken off a little bit. I’ve had some luck with stories, and I grew one particular story into this novel.”

DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Pushkin Press via NetGalley for providing a digital ARC of Dinner Party: A Tragedy for review. All opinions expressed in this review are my own personal opinions.

I initially received this novel as a NetGalley ARC, but had problems with the publication properly displaying on my Kindle. I'm not going to lie, I (incorrectly) assumed it was the publisher's careless editing, but someone from Pushkin Press reached out. By that time though, I had already put the ebook on hold at my library and received it shortly after. I just finished it today, and I'm happy to report that it was an enjoyable read!

It's worth noting that the title and summary are easily confusing: firstly, I assumed that the story and flashbacks were going to happen during the titular dinner party that the protagonist, Kate, throws. That's not the case.

I found the length of this story well-timed, and appreciated Gilmartin noting the year and location of each section in her work. As I read through a well-loved short story collection, the lack of clarity of the time/timeline makes the experience both confusing and frustrating, so I cannot thank Gilmartin (or her editors) for the inclusion of both a date and location.

I think the premise of Dinner Party: A Tragedy is really good, and I think that the execution was quite good. Unfortunately, I felt that the initial dinner party was anti-climactic as was the final dinner party that readers get to observe, but I wonder if that's an indication of Kate's reconciliation of her and her siblings' relationships with her mother. But Gilmartin was able to capture the tension among family members so well. There were moments when I stopped reading and thought, "This could be anyone's family. The ways in which Gilmartin wrote Kate and her siblings Peter, Ray and her twin sister Elaine made me think about how my sister and I interacted and treated one another as children, and it was those moments that shined for me.

I would also like to note that I recently read Megan Hunter's shorter fiction The Harpy, and the ways in which Kate's mother reacts to her life and where her life has brought her (not in the emotional outbursts but rather the ways in which she questions her decisions) reminded me of Lucy's sentiments as she passively moves in and out and through her life. While there isn't a one to one correlation between the two women, the lack of joy that their lives had at times felt similar.

I hope to read more of Sarah Gilmartin's work in the future!

If you're a fan of Irish literature/fiction, family dynamics/drama, food content, and/or reading about women overcoming severe emotional trauma, then this is the book for you!

Many thanks to One/Pushkin Press and NetGalley for kindly letting me read an ARC of Dinner Party: A Tragedy by Sarah Gilmartin!

A realistic look into the life of a family dealing with loss. The plot of Dinner Party focuses mainly on the family relationships between the characters. The focus of the story is on Kate. Her twin sister, Elaine, tragically passes away at sixteen, and Kate never really deals with this loss. She develops an eating disorder, and struggles with it throughout much of the novel. Another large chunk of the story involves the fraught relationship that Kate and her brothers have with their mother. Mrs. Gleeson seems to hold her children to an unattainable standard, and judges them greatly for falling short. She doesn't know how to appropriately deal with her own sense of loss, and often takes it out on her children. There's a lot of strain in this family.
This novel is definitely dark, but if you know what you're in for when picking it up, it's worth the read. A deep and insightful view of loss and how a family can react to it.

Really liked this book about a dysfunctional mother and her family, coping with the deaths of two family members with yearly gatherings. Each family member is coping as best they can with the dysfunctionalism they’re experiencing each day.

Brilliant stunning book and the author is just the best. I found the characters relatable and loveable and loath able too!! Thanks for sharing early

A well written character-driven family saga, “The Dinner Party” is a sad story of layers of grief within Kate’s family and the life long impacts on self and relationships of childhood trauma. Family should be a place of safety and solace. Kate craves this desperately but her experiences of family in the current timeline is tinged with tensions and unspoken (and spoken) competition with family members about who is grieving the most. Kate’s grief is all encompassing to her physical and mental health. And I was compelled to read on to see how she processes it. Whilst slower in pace than I normally enjoy, there was plenty in the characters to keep the pages turning. Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the advance copy.

A fantastic read that had me hooked all the way through, it is an absolutely gripping read. Be warned if you are going to read this book set aside a day or two because you won't be able to put it down

I was lucky to receive an advance copy of Dinner Party by Sarah Gilmartin from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for my honest review and opinion. I had a bit of a struggle reading this as it was a bit slow moving but I did stick with it and am glad I did. It turned out to be a really good book and I was pleased with the ending. Don't give up! It's worth the read.

Review: Dinner Party ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆
Author: Sarah Gilmartin
Publication Date: 07 March 2023
Publisher: Pushkin Press
General Fiction (Adult) | Literary Fiction | Women's Fiction

I received this book from Sarah Gilmartin and Pushkin Press, as an advanced eArc for my honest review any opinions that come from this review are my own. Thank you to both the Author and the publisher and Netgalley for allowing me to read and review this book.

This was a nice and easy read for me. The author kept me engaged the whole time I was reading. The story itself provided real-life situations that I could relate to. I see a lot of reviews saying it was slow-paced I didn't think it was it was paced nicely for me. It was a page-turner dripping with family drama and I ate it up.