Review: The Last Perfect Summer by Karla Stover | A Historical Romance Set During WWI
A coming-of-age story set against the shifting tides of war.
In this review of The Last Perfect Summer by Karla Stover, I share my thoughts on the story, characters, and what readers can expect from this WW1 historical fiction novel.
About the Book
The Last Perfect Summer By Karla Stover
Published by BWL Publishing on January 1, 2026
Genres: Historical Romance
Formats: eBook, Paperback
Pages: 273
Source: eARC courtesy of Goddess Fish PromotionsBy a stroke of luck, eighteen-year-old Louise Tanquist has fallen into a new job as a photographer’s assistant. But it’s 1917 and the United States is in the verge of entering World War 1. Suddenly, Tacoma, Washington where she lives is being overrun with army recruits headed for nearby Camp Lewis.
The Red Cross is asking for socks, socks, and more socks; the Foundation Boat Building Company needs volunteers to paint camouflage on their shops, and spies are skulking around the waterfront.
Just when Louise thinks she has more things to photograph than she can find time for, let alone to find time for a new romance, she suffers a serious assault.
With her beau out of town, she has an opportunity to go north to the Makah Indian Reservation and provide photographs for a book on Native Americans.
It’s an exciting time to be alive but Louise knows she will lose friends and relatives in the war, and that the perfect summers she grew up with are over.
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Review at a Glance
| Genre | Historical Romance |
| Setting | Tacoma, Washington (1917) |
| Length | 273 pages |
| Content Rating | Moderate (themes of assault, war, and social constraints) |
| My Rating | ⭐⭐⭐⭐ ½ |
Quick Take: A quietly powerful coming-of-age story set against the shifting tides of war and identity.
Content Considerations:
- Non-graphic assault (significant to the storyline)
- War-related themes (WWI, uncertainty, loss)
- Gender roles and societal limitations
Here's what stayed with me and where The Last Perfect Summer quietly shines.
My Thoughts
What stayed with me most in The Last Perfect Summer wasn't just the historical setting-it was the quiet sense of standing at the edge of change, knowing life will never quite return to what it once was.
Louise Tanquist is an easy character to settle into. She feels grounded and real, with a thoughtful curiosity about the world around her that fits beautifully with her work as a photographer's assistant. There's something especially compelling about seeing this moment in history through her lens-both literally and figuratively. She isn't simply observing the world; she's trying to understand her place within it.
The early twentieth-century setting is richly drawn without ever feeling overwhelming. Tacoma in 1917 comes alive through small, meaningful details-the shift in daily life as war approaches, the sense of community, and the subtle tension that something larger is unfolding just beyond the edges of ordinary routines. It's not a dramatic, sweeping portrayal of war, but rather a deeply personal one, where the impact is felt in quieter, more intimate ways.
There's also a thoughtful exploration of independence and expectation, particularly for women of the time. Louise is navigating not only the external changes brought on by the war, but also the internal shifts that come with growing up, making choices, and beginning to see the world-and the people in it-with clearer eyes.
The pacing leans toward the reflective rather than the fast-moving, which suits the story well. This is very much a character-driven novel, one that unfolds gradually and invites you to sit with its moments rather than rush through them. The emotional weight builds softly, but it lingers.
Overall, The Last Perfect Summer is a quietly powerful coming-of-age story set against a world in transition. It's thoughtful, atmospheric, and grounded in the kind of emotional truth that stays with you after the final page.
If you enjoy reflective historical fiction with a strong sense of place, you might also like my review of A Tiny Piece of Blue by Charlotte Whitney, which offers a similarly thoughtful look at personal growth during a changing time
In Conclusion
The Last Perfect Summer is a reflective and thoughtfully written historical romance that captures a moment in time when both the world and one young woman's life are quietly, but irrevocably, changing. With its strong sense of place, gentle pacing, and focus on personal growth, this is a story that will appeal to readers who enjoy character-driven historical fiction with emotional depth.
It's not a sweeping wartime drama, but rather an intimate look at how large events ripple through everyday lives. For readers who appreciate subtle storytelling and a coming-of-age journey set against a meaningful historical backdrop, this is a novel worth settling into.Excerpt
To give you a feel for Karla Stover's writing style and the tone of the story, here is a brief excerpt from The Last Perfect Summer.
Even during the day, walking in parts of Wright Park was difficult. Not all the old growth trees-firs, cedar, and big leaf maples-had been harvested, and they towered over the ground, blocking sunlight. Under them, moist loam provided a natural environment for sword ferns, oak ferns, and wood ferns, some of which local tribal elders occasionally came to harvest and used to treat wounds.
The ferns knit deceptive blankets through Oregon grape and salal, climbed rotting trunks, and entwined and encased broken limbs and boulders. Where the trees had been cut, their stumps attracted both soft moss and thorny berry vines. In those places, the park still resembled an ancient forest, and the smell of pitch and fir needles and rotting foliage filled the air.
Roots protruded through piles of broken tree limbs, twigs, and decaying leaves, and Louise Tanquist took care not to trip. She wanted to be hidden before dawn broke, but the unwieldy bundle of canvas tarp she carried was heavy, and she had to stop several times to shift it from one arm to another.
She realized that dawn wasn't far off when first one rooster and then another began to crow. The sounds seemed to usher in a pearly light on the horizon behind Mount Rainier, partially obscured by an opaque haze-the result of smoke from distant forest fires.
When City Hall's clock began to sound the hour, doors in the area opened and slammed as men left for work. With a frantic look around, and just in time, she found the remains of several downed trees and dropped onto the fragrant but damp sawdust. There she hunkered down and covered herself with the tarp.
Through a small hole, she watched as legs in a variety of pants-mostly dungarees and Carhartts-and an assortment of boots passed by: footwear belonging to loggers, fishermen, boat builders, dock laborers, railroad employees, and brewery workers. For several minutes their voices rose and fell, sometimes talking seriously, other times laughing-Tacoma's work staff hurrying to the streetcar lines.
In the brief quiet that followed, Louise shifted around trying to find a soft spot, wishing she was kneeling on moss instead of sawdust. Then the new Central School's bell rang a warning. Having gone to the first Central School, she knew the final bell would ring fifteen minutes later-and woe be to the child who was late without a good excuse.
She was remembering her own school days when, through the hole, Louise saw groups of boys taking the park path to Eighth Street. Tacoma's fast-growing population, both white and ethnic, meant they wore a variety of clothes: short pants, knickers, hand-me-down overalls with rolled-up cuffs, belts, suspenders, button-down shirts or threadbare flannel, and jackets-many in a working-man's style.
Some of the boys had on laced-up oxfords, others high-tops or boots. Most wore socks which poked out of the tops, but some didn't, exposing an inch or two of bare legs. They ran and shouted, kicked leaves, and punched each other in the arm, but the little girls who followed behind, often walking arm in arm, were much quieter.
Louise's mother, Nell Tanquist, was a renowned dressmaker with a couture in downtown Tacoma, and Louise had learned a lot about styles when helping there. Now she saw how the shortages of fabric-some blamed on the war in Europe-had changed clothing styles even for little girls.
Unlike when Louise was in school, these girls wore loose-waisted dresses or skirts, both of which ended near the knee. Smock dresses with pinafores, skirts with middy blouses, prints and ginghams in bright colors, paired with knee or ankle socks. Watching the schoolgirls, Louise thought they were very lucky that their hems were so much shorter than when she had been in school.
"The mills are so busy making cloth for uniforms they don't have time to make fabrics for civilians," Nell had said.
"Does that mean you won't be going to San Francisco this year to look for fabrics?"
"It's not likely."
Louise sighed. Except for the year she'd been adopted-the year Nell had gone into Mexico, been gone for over four months, and returned with beautiful embroideries-she generally spent a month shopping for both fabrics and trims in San Francisco.
Louise knew she devoted hours at O'Connor, Moffat and Company, The City of Paris, and the Salon de Couture, making notes of the newest styles; going to Fownes to look at leather and fur; and ending with trips to The Emporium, the Sing Chong Importing Company, the Sing Fat Company, and the Nan Fook Who Company, all in Chinatown, where she placed bulk orders for silk and embroidered Mandarin coats, kimonos, and skirts.
"A feast for the eyes and a joy for the body," Nell said when her orders began arriving and she and Louise unpacked the crates.
The previous year, she'd promised to take Louise with her the next time she went south, and Louise had two reasons for wanting to go: one was that she hoped to find information about her birth family, and the other was that, since she was a photographer, she wanted to take pictures of all the different things she'd see there.
Now, hunkered under the smelly tarp and thinking about the trip postponed until the war was over, she tried not to moan.
When I'm an old lady, I'll likely still be waiting for something interesting, like a trip to California, to happen.
Meet the Author
About Karla Stover
Karla Stover graduated from the University of Washington with honors in history. She has been writing for more than twenty-five years and is well-versed in Puget Sound history.
Locally, her credits include The Tacoma News Tribune, the Tacoma Weekly, the Tacoma Reporter and the Puget Sound Business Journal. Nationally, she has published in Birds and Blooms and the Ruralite, Internationally, she was a regular contributor to the European Crown and the Imperial Russian Journal.
For fifteen years she hosted a radio program in her hometown, Tacoma (Washington). She won the Christell Prize for a short story called “One Day at Appomattox.”
She is a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution and the Tacoma Historical Society, and is an avid but unsuccessful gardener. Seven of her 10 published books are either fiction or non-fiction set in Tacoma. Her entire working career was at Merrill Lynch.
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Tour dates: March 17 to April 17, 2026. To see the full schedule of stops, visit the
Goddess Fish Promotions - The Last Perfect Summer Tour Page.
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Thank you so much for featuring and reviewing THE LAST PERFECT SUMMER.