Last Orders

De: Graham Swift

Narrado por: Simon Prebble, Gigi Marceau Clarke, Jenny Sterlin, Ian Stewart, Gerard Doyle, Simon Jones, Domonick Hawksley

Man Booker Prize, Fiction, 1996

When four men carry out another's final wishes, they are forced to take stock of who they are, who they were, and what lies in between.

"It ain't like your regular sort of day," Ray admits. The Coach and Horses pub in London's East End opened just five minutes ago, and Ray is already having a pint. He's soon joined by Lenny and Vic, who arrives carrying a box. Vic "twists the box round so we can see there's a white card taped to one side. There's a date and a number and name: Jack Arthur Dodds."

The three men, friends since World War II, have gathered to carry out Jack's last orders and deliver his ashes to the sea. A fourth comes, too, and serves as the driver: Jack's adopted son, Vince. As they move together toward the fulfillment of their mission, their errand becomes an extraordinary journey into their collective and individual pasts. Their voices - and Jack's, and that of Jack's widow Amy - combine in a choir of sorrow and resentment, passion and regret. An interwoven series of first-person narratives shifts between times and tenses, memories and revelations.

A testament to a changing England, a stark portrait of its working class, and a morality tale that hides its ambition and expertise under moving naturalism, Last Orders is a stunning achievement by one of England's greatest living writers.

©1996 Grham Swift (P)2003 HighBridge Company

Reseñas de la Crítica

"A profound, intricately stratified novel full of life, love lost, and love enduring." (The Globe and Mail)
"Written with impeccable honesty and paced with unflagging momentum, the novel ends with a scene of transcendent understanding." (Publishers Weekly)

Loved it.

The narration brought back so many memories of find times had with friends involved in the Spitalfield market. EastEnders are the bomb!

Give it a Chance!

This is one of those books you really have to listen to to understand, its life with regrets, something we all can reflect on.

Friends forever care even in death.

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

I first saw this as a great movie with a great English cast and was eager to see how this audio would compare and it does. This is how London was when I was growing up, friends forever looking after the loved ones, caring for mates.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

The care for the widow, the treatment of the ashes with reverence.

Any additional comments?

A true story of friendship in a time when friends really were friends for life.

Fully engaging

Fully engaging series of intertwined spoken thoughts about the last rites for a dead friend, each character provided with their own voice.

An interesting piece of writing

The writing by far is better than the story itself. It very slow start. I would've liked a little more narrative upfront, at least a sense of knowing where things were going. But the writing is phenomenal.