Lunch by Karen Moline (1994) is a sharp, satirical novel that dives into the worlds of celebrity, excess, and reinvention. At its center is Gillian West, a jaded journalist and gossip columnist whose career and personal life are crumbling. When she’s invited to a lavish “power lunch” with her old rival, media moguls, and Hollywood types, the gathering spirals into a biting comedy of manners—where everyone’s secrets, schemes, and vulnerabilities are served up alongside the caviar.
Moline uses the premise of one outrageous lunch to peel back the layers of New York and L.A. media culture in the 1990s—skewering fame, ambition, and vanity with humor and bite. It’s both a character-driven social satire and a critique of the machinery that builds up and tears down public figures.
