--- title: Anita de Monte Laughs Last: 100 Must-Read Books of 2024 description: Find out why "Anita de Monte Laughs Last" is on TIME's list of the must-read books of the year. canonical: https://time.com/collections/must-read-books-2024/7172851/anita-de-monte-laughs-last/ article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2024-11-13T13:08:34.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-03-03T00:42:35.448Z article:section: Entertainment og:title: 'Anita de Monte Laughs Last' Is One of the 100 Must-Read Books of 2024 og:description: Here's why it made the list og:url: https://time.com/collections/must-read-books-2024/7172851/anita-de-monte-laughs-last/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8997baeb5c2fef00/698a8d0a47ca385f753c2f56/Anita-De-Monte-Laughs-Last-Xochitl-Gonzalez.jpg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: 'Anita de Monte Laughs Last' Is One of the 100 Must-Read Books of 2024 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: 'Anita de Monte Laughs Last' Is One of the 100 Must-Read Books of 2024 twitter:description: Here's why it made the list twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8997baeb5c2fef00/698a8d0a47ca385f753c2f56/Anita-De-Monte-Laughs-Last-Xochitl-Gonzalez.jpg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 --- Nov 13, 2024 # Anita de Monte Laughs Last by [Rachel Sonis](https://time.com/author/rachel-sonis/) ## Rachel Sonis Sonis is an Ideas editor at TIME.  Xochitl Gonzalez pulls no punches against the art world in her latest propulsive novel, _Anita de Monte Laughs Last_. In the follow-up to her best-selling 2022 debut, [_Olga Dies Dreaming_](https://time.com/collection/must-read-books-2022/6228603/olga-dies-dreaming/), Gonzalez explores how legacy gets warped over time. The novel follows the lives of Anita de Monte, an up-and-coming artist in 1985, and Raquel Toro, a third-year art history student at Brown University in 1998\. Anita—loosely inspired by real-life Cuban-American artist Ana Mendieta—is the rising star of the New York City art scene; that is, until she falls out of a window after a fight with her husband, the minimalist sculptor Jack Martin. Raquel, meanwhile, in search of her thesis subject, rediscovers Anita’s story and the cracks in how it’s been told. As she navigates class, misogyny, and race in an Ivy-league setting, Raquel sets out on a journey to uncover what really happened to the prolific artist. **Buy Now:** _Anita de Monte Laughs Last_ on [Bookshop](https://bookshop.org/a/4973/9781250786210) | [Amazon](https://amzn.to/4fhI1iS) | [Barnes & Noble](https://fave.co/4dNKoZp) These are independent reviews of the products mentioned, but TIME receives a commission when purchases are made through affiliate links at no additional cost to the purchaser. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Article","@id":"https://time.com/collections/must-read-books-2024/7172851/anita-de-monte-laughs-last/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/collections/must-read-books-2024/7172851/anita-de-monte-laughs-last/"},"headline":"Anita de Monte Laughs Last","datePublished":"2024-11-13T13:08:34.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-03T00:42:35.448Z","description":"","url":"https://time.com/collections/must-read-books-2024/7172851/anita-de-monte-laughs-last/","keywords":["Books","E-Commerce","list","franchise"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8997baeb5c2fef00/698a8d0a47ca385f753c2f56/Anita-De-Monte-Laughs-Last-Xochitl-Gonzalez.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Rachel Sonis","jobTitle":"Sonis is an Ideas editor at TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/rachel-sonis/"}],"creator":"Rachel Sonis","articleSection":"Entertainment","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8997baeb5c2fef00/698a8d0a47ca385f753c2f56/Anita-De-Monte-Laughs-Last-Xochitl-Gonzalez.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/entertainment/","name":"Entertainment"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/books/","name":"Books"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/collections/must-read-books-2024/7172851/anita-de-monte-laughs-last/","name":"Anita de Monte Laughs Last"}}]}] ```