Sign-In
Cart
The Last Mixtape
Paperback
RomanceGeneral FictionLiterary Fiction
Publisher Price: $15.99
Publisher: Socks & Mittens Publishing
Published: Nov 5 2025
Pages: 248
Weight: 0.64
Height: 0.56 Width: 5.50 Depth: 8.50
Language: English
James Nakamura is a first-grade teacher reeling from the loss of his younger sister. As he struggles to return to the rhythms of normal life, grief is a constant companion, lurking everywhere from a lost cassette tape to existential moments in the dairy aisle. As the immediate support of bereavement fades, and life quietly moves on without him, James is left with a hole in his heart that's impossible to fill.
Longing for comfort and connection, James finds himself unexpectedly pulled between two women: Allie, a childhood crush reappearing at just the right time, and Shannon, a student teacher with an infectious innocence. Allie offers a connection to the past and to his younger sister, while Shannon anchors him to the life he's still trying to build. But both women are already entangled in other relationships, leaving James caught in what a friend dubs the love pentagram.
As he navigates a world of long-distance phone calls, coffee dates, and teaching six-year-olds to read, James is haunted by the sense that his life has been irrevocably thrown off course. Behind everything he does, he unconsciously wrestles with a question he hasn't fully put into words: How do you become who you're meant to be when tragedy has stolen the very years intended to define you?
Brutally honest, infused with dark humor, and steeped in '90s nostalgia, The Last Mixtape invites readers to laugh even while experiencing James's heartache. It's a bittersweet, deeply human story about love, loss, and the songs that make us rewind.
Also in
Literary Fiction
Elizabeth Spencer: Novels & Stories (Loa #344): The Voice at the Back Door / The Light in the Piazza / Knights and Dragons / Stories
Spencer, Elizabeth
Hardcover
Philip Roth: Novels 1973-1977 (Loa #165): The Great American Novel / My Life as a Man / The Professor of Desire
Roth, Philip
Hardcover
John Updike: Novels 1978-1984 (Loa #339): The Coup / Rabbit Is Rich / The Witches of Eastwick
Updike, John
Hardcover
The Patrick Melrose Novels: Never Mind, Bad News, Some Hope, and Mother's Milk
St Aubyn, Edward
Paperback