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Last Orders
Last Orders
Last Orders
Audiobook8 hours

Last Orders

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

3.5/5

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About this audiobook

Set in Southeast England, friendship and love among a group of men whose lives have been intertwined since World War II. When one dies, the survivors are brought together and are forced to take stock of the paths their lives have taken, by choice and by accident, since the war. Winner of the 1996 Booker Prize.
LanguageEnglish
Release dateApr 28, 2003
ISBN9781598873054
Last Orders
Author

Graham Swift

Graham Swift was born in 1949 and is the author of eleven novels, two collections of short stories, including the highly acclaimed England and Other Stories, and of Making an Elephant, a book of essays, portraits, poetry and reflections on his life in writing. His most recent novel, Mothering Sunday, became an international bestseller and won The Hawthornden Prize for best work of imaginative literature. With Waterland he won the Guardian Fiction Prize, and with Last Orders the Booker Prize. Both novels were made into films. His work has appeared in over thirty languages.

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Reviews for Last Orders

Rating: 3.591443073825503 out of 5 stars
3.5/5

596 ratings28 reviews

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  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    When one of their number dies, drinking pals get together to scatter the ashes following his wishes. In remembering Jack, they remember and relive a lot of other things: misplaced loyalties, missed opportunities, love affairs, business deals, the vagaries of life. On the journey to Margate, Jack's chosen resting place, they argue and behave like the boys they once were, while we realize they know each other less than they think. The black humour fits this story of Londoners. This is an exceptional tale, a well-deserved winner of the Booker Prize 1996. It made for an excellent movie too, with star-filled cast including Michael Caine as Jack and Helen Mirren as Amy.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Four men gather in a London pub. They have taken it upon themselves to carry out the last orders of Jack Dodds, master butcher, and deliver his ashes to the sea.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Graham Swift is excellent at settings and this novel is no exception. This is, with it's superb characterisations and descriptions definitely East London. It's a good insight into a now disappearing English pub culture for those not familiar with it. A great short novel, that never overstretches itself, exploring the relationships and differing viewpoints of three friends as they journey to Margate to scatter the ashes of their late drinking companion. Don't miss the film (after you've finished the book!). Read The Old Devils by Kingsley Amis if you want to see how this is done without humour. For more Swift move on to his astonishing Waterland if you haven't already read it.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    As the story opens, Jack has died and four of his friends are gathered in a London pub to carry out his last wishes regarding scattering his ashes. This small group of characters reminisces about Jack, which leads them to musings about the past. We learn their backstories through flashbacks, along with facts about Jack’s life. It is told in an atmospheric way. The tone is wistful. It is a quiet and reflective story. It is not all that dynamic, but I enjoyed it and am glad I read it. This book won the Booker Prize in 1996.3.5
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    Thius is the story of a group of friends in England who are charged with carrying out the "last orders" of Jack Dodds, that of scattering his ashes into the sea at Margate. Each chapter is told in the voice of a different character weaving back and forth through time.Even though this book was a Booker Prize winner, I found it very hard to read. I couldn't keep the characters straight. I couldn't follow some of the local dialect and felt, with that, I was losing some of the story. I finished it, but only because others have thought of it more highly than myself, and I wanted to see why.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    LAST ORDERS, by Graham Swift. This one's been sitting on my shelf for several years. Won the Booker Prize. Just read about 150 pages of it - set in the late 80s, it's about three old London geezers, and one younger one, on their way to an English beach to scatter the ashes of one of their old pals. Along the way, you learn something of their history, about their years in the army & navy during WWII. (The younger one did five years with the Foreign Legion.) There are some unpleasant connections, revelations of infidelity, etc. Blah blah ... Along the way, they snipe at each other and do some drinking. The narrative moves at a glacial pace. Not sure if I'll finish it. Stay tuned. - Tim Bazzett, author of the memoir, BOOKLOVER
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    At first blush, you might think this was a book ripping off Faulkner's As I Lay Dying, and it's not an unfair comparison. What Graham Swift does, however, is examine the strictures of working-class Britain and the culture of homosocial relations among British working-class men, particularly among men who fought in World War II and are building a civilian life together. The book's title is itself a play on words, with last orders standing in for last rites and the last order at the pub simultaneously. I also think it happens to read a bit more fluidly than Faulkner, so you might want to give this a try, even if (especially if) you did not care for As I Lay Dying. This is interesting and engaging without being too dense. I am definitely going to give more of Swift's work a read.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The tale of four men driving to the sea to spread the ashes of their friend. Their intertwined lives are revealed in the backstories. Excellently written, humorous, bitter sweet.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I really enjoy life like situations where humour is used to highlight everyday issues. This book, although about losing a loved friend, brings the gang together for the final farewell.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is Swift's Booker Prize-winning novel from 1996. Some have noted similarities between it and Faulkner's As I Lay Dying, but that does not detract from its quality which has been evident in Swift's writing since his earlier success with Waterland (a novel that was short-listed for the Booker). While I found it a bit slow at first, it eventually evolved into a captivating tale of English working-class families in the four decades following WW II. When Jack Dodds dies suddenly of cancer after years of running a butcher shop in London, he leaves a strange request--namely, that his ashes be scattered off Margate pier into the sea. None could be better be suited to fulfill this wish than his three oldest drinking buddies--insurance man Ray, vegetable seller Lenny, and undertaker Vic, all of whom, like Jack himself, fought also as soldiers or sailors in the long-ago world war.The narrative start is developed with an economy that presents (through the characters' own voices, one after another) the story's humanity and depth with a minimum of melodrama. The group is uncomfortable at first as evidenced by weak and self- conscious jocular remarks when they meet at their local pub in the company of the urn holding Jack's ashes; but once the group gets on the road, in an expensive car driven by Jack's adoptive son, Vince, the story starts gradually to move forward, cohere, and deepen. The reader gradually learns why it is that no wife comes along, why three marriages out of three broke apart, and why Vince always hated his stepfather Jack and still does--or so he thinks. As you might expect there are stories shared with topics like tales of innocent youth, suffering wives, early loves, lost daughters, secret affairs, and old antagonisms. There is even a fistfight over the dead on an English hilltop, and a strewing of Jack's ashes into roiling sea waves that will draw up feelings perhaps unexpectedly strong. Graham Swift is able to avoid artificiality by listening closely to these lives and presenting realistic voices that share stories of humanity with the proverbial ring of truth.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    At first glance this seems such a simple tale, a man's dying wish is to have his ashes thrown into the sea of Margate pier and four drinking mates undertake this task making a few stops along the way but there is much more to it than that. Firstly all the characters are working class, we have Vic an undertaker, Ray an insurance broker and horse racing gambler, Lenny a fruit and veg man, Vince a second hand car salesman and of course the deceased Jack Dodds, a Master Butcher. Each man along with the widow Amy narrates part of the story each unraveling a little of theirs' and Jack's past. We get life and death,childhood and parenthood, loyalty and deception,work,regret and lost opportunities,in fact all the ingredients that makes up everyday life.Initially I found the constant skipping from one narrator to another and from the past to the present a little baffling but soon got the hang of it and even began to enjoy these constant switches of emphasis. Despite the gloomy subject matter there was also a certain amount of humour which lightened the mood at times. I also enjoyed the author's writing style feeling that he had a good grasp and insight into his characters, the most poignant for me was strangely the one who didn't go, the widow. Instead she has her own journey to make, to visit and tell her mentally retarded daughter June that Jack has died, a daughter whom Jack has shunned practically all her life but whom it could be argued that in his choice of final resting place he finally acknowledges in death what he could not face in life.However, for me, the final third of the book rather lets it down overall. This switches predominantly between the hospital ward and the home where June has lived most of her life, coupled with the meandering nature of the journey to Margate meant I felt that the tale got somewhat bogged down at times. That said I still enjoyed the book as a whole and will certainly look out for some of Swift's other works but a worthy winner of the Booker Prize? I'm not so sure.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Excellent novel highlighting the relationship among men
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This book follows three old codgers and a slightly younger old codger on a pilgrimage to Margate to scatter their late friend's ashes in the sea according to his wishes. I could almost hear Chas and Dave playing along in the background as I read it. It managed to fuse a colloquial narrative with an unashamedly literary style and the overall result was pretty good. Though the viewpoint shifted with each chapter, and the story jumped around in space and time, it was usually easy to work out what was happening. That became more difficult towards the end, however, where I felt as though I was lodged in that part of the character's brain that deals with abstract concepts, and would rather have been in the part that deals with specifics. A good read though, complex and surprisingly touching, and with characters who already speak like Michael Caine, Bob Hoskins et al, I'm sure the film cast itself.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    A sad book. Well written. Not enthralling.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Evocative, poignant, well judged.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    It has taken me weeks to finish this. I really don't feel that I was very engaged by it.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    In a way, the plot of Last Orders is very simple: a group of friends drive to the coast to scatter the ashes of their friend Jack. Yes, that's it. Along the way they have arguments and fights and endless pints of beer, but none of that is really the point. The real action of this book takes place in the past, appropriately enough for a novel about scattering ashes. These are old men remembering not only Jack but also their own former selves.There are lots of lies and secrets and betrayals, but most of all there's a sense of missed chances. There's a phrase that really stuck in my mind, "If we could see and choose". Meaning that all the characters had ideas of themselves as young men, ideas of who they wanted to be. Jack wanted to be a doctor, Ray a jockey, Lenny a boxer. But then things got in the way: the war, family, health, and a hundred other reasons why things didn't work out the way they should have done. If we could see the way everything would pan out and choose based on the outcomes, things would be very different. But we can't. We choose based on what seems best at the time, or easiest, or what other people want us to do. And sometimes we don't really get to choose at all. And so our lives are not what we would have chosen, but what we end up with.The novel, which won the 1996 Booker Prize, is written from multiple perspectives. The voice of each character is believable, with working class language and speech patterns (the opening line, for example, goes "It aint your regular sort of day"). This book is a good reminder that language doesn't have to be correct to be beautiful. I think it's quite hard to do it well, and if you get it wrong then too much dialect of any kind can be quite annoying. The only other book I can think of where I liked the dialect and found it not only believable but beautiful was The Color Purple by Alice Walker. Graham Swift, like Walker, manages it perfectly: even though he went to the same posh public school as I did, and Cambridge after that, there's never a moment when his Bermondsey slang rings false.It's a maudlin kind of book, again appropriately - not just because of the death at the centre but because of the pubs that feature so heavily throughout. It feels like the sort of story you'd be told by an old man sitting at the bar nursing his half-finished pint on a slow Tuesday afternoon in one of those old-fashioned pubs where there's no music or TVs to drown out the melancholy thoughts that quiet drinking can bring on. You can feel the longing in the characters, sad and resigned to what their lives have become but still remembering what they would have done, if only they could see and choose.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Started off with a burst, but got bogged down because all the characters were such sad sacks, particularly the narrator. Liked the film though. Michael Caine and David Hemmings were tough and funny; that energy is missing from the book.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Absolutely riveting in a nosy sort of way. I loved the characters, couldn't wait to see how their lives unfolded and who would be entwined with who next. All lives are like this, if you live long enough. A country town where generations have lived has lots of little secrets and gossip.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I really liked it, though all the British-isms (and English not being my native language) made it a bit of a hard read.Perhaps what I enjoyed the most was seeing how the characters' lives were intertwined in so many different ways that not even they were aware of... seemed to me like a very good (perhaps even outstanding) depiction of life and of what REAL lifelong, close-knit relationships are like, without the mushiness/corniness that so often mucks-up an otherwise great read.All in all, I definitely recommend it and will add "Waterland" to my already HUGE to-be-read pile.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A group of old friends make a pilgrimage from London to the Kent coast to scatter the ashes of their friend Jack. Beneath the surface of their relationships are old grudges and everyone has suffered disappointments and wrong decisions.The book is narrated in the first person but shifts from character to character, but helpfully most chapters have the characters name at the top so you know who it is! It is a very English novel - it is a road trip but on a very small scale and it doesn't offer any neat resolutions. The characters are ordinary people but they are believeable and sympathetic. I loved this book.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    In this Booker prize-winning novel, four men spend a day travelling from London to the coast to scatter the ashes of Jack Dodds, as he requested just before his death. Three of the men -- Ray, Lenny, and Vic -- have been friends with Jack for most of their adult life, living in the same working-class community, and earning their living in local businesses. The fourth, Vince, is Jack's son. Thoughts, feelings, and history are revealed through short chapters, each told from one character's point of view. Each man has experienced love, loss, friendship, disappointment, and varying degrees of prosperity. Their lives are intertwined, sometimes in ways that the characters are unaware of individually. For the most part, these men swagger and boast while inside, they are full of pain. There are a few women in this book, but they are minor characters. Jack's wife, Amy, is portrayed in the most detail. I felt sorry for her; she was trapped in a less-than-satisfying marriage, with family obligations that Jack refused to share. Swift has a way of evoking a time and place, and the characters seemed like real people. Their stories were moving in parts. I'm a bit surprised this won the Booker Prize, as it doesn't seem to compare to other winners I've read, but it's a passable if somewhat melancholy read.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    This book and I did not go well together. Can't say why exactely. It's not that it's a bad novel. I suppose Swift is a good writer. It was nice to have the different characters each tell little parts of a story, that passed from the present to the recent past, to long ago. In the end you've got this picture of a situation. Which is not a spectacular situation, or adventurous. It's about ordinary men and women living their lives. Still, I had a hard time finishing this book. Just didn't feel any real interest or emotion for the characters or the storyline. It all seemed distant. Rationally I say that it was well done, but irrationally I thought, to be honest, that it was very boring...
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    An outstanding novel. Obviously a homage to Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying. The narration is the same - first person serial, with seven of the characters sharing the duties of narration, all in first person. The chapter titles are the names of the characters who narrate, except for the chapters which are named for locations, which serve to advance the action.The story is similar to Faulkner also. A man has died, and wishes his friends and family to make a trip to throw his ashes off a pier. Sound similar?And it shares some of the black humor of Faulkner as well, although not as dramatic. With Faulkner, I shook my head in disbelief at the actions of the characters, while actually believing what had occurred. Swift does not evoke that same reaction, but portions of the character’s “quest” are wryly humorous.So an outstanding effort. I admire anyone who can plan and execute a novel of this much precision.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Realistic portrayal of the relationships and long history of a group of Bermondsey men who undertake a road trip to scatter the ashes of Jack Dodds. Simple but somehow lovely.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    "On the surface a tale of a simple if increasingly bizarre day's outing, Last Orders is Graham Swift's most poignant exploration of the complexity and courage of ordinary lives."So says the blurb on the back of the book. The outing mentioned is a trip by four men to scatter into the sea at Margate the ashes of Jack Dodds, friend to three of the men and adoptive father of the fourth. The account of the trip is told by the four men in turns interspersed with the viewpoint of Amy, Jack's widow, who chooses to spend the afternoon as she would ordinarily do - visiting her and Jack's profoundly mentally disabled 50-year old daughter in a residential home and, from time to time, interspersed also with that of Mandy, Jack and Amy's daughter-in-law.As the trip and the memories unfold, we are introduced to secrets which might not be secrets after all, to the lifelong consequences of thoughtless, and occasionally desperate, actions, to regrets and wasted opportunities.What let this novel down, for me at least, was the indistinct characterisation of several of the male characters - specifically Ray and Lenny. Or rather there were times when I struggled to hear their voices and experiences as different from each other and it was particularly difficult to remember which of them was married to whom and which wayward daughter belonged to which of them.I had been meaning to get hold of and read Swift's earlier novel, Waterland, which I saw many years ago in Norwich in a stage adaptation so was very pleased indeed to pick this other novel of his up recently.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Well, I must say that at first I thought this was going to be an "iffy" book, but I stayed with it and now I'm really happy I did. What a fine novel! What great writing! Now I must find more by this author.Let me also say that this book is not for everyone. It is not something you can pick up and expect to finish as quickly as, say, a James Patterson novel. It takes time to read and digest, so if you're looking for something quick and easy, forget it. This book has substance, and you will really want to give it some thought while you read it.Here's a brief synopsis with no spoilers:As the book opens, we learn that a group of friends have all gathered together to fulfill the "last orders" of their friend Jack Dodds. Jack has died, and his final wish was to have his ashes scattered over the sea in a tourist town in England called Margate. Three in the group-- Vic, Lenny & Ray, were friends of Jack's; Vince was Jack's son. With Vince in the driver's seat, the four slowly wind their way down to Margate. Each person has a voice in this novel, as do others not on the trip, and through their stories, each person's relationship with Jack is revealed, as well as the relationships between each other. It's not a linear story, so don't expect one; in many ways, details are revealed little by little so that the fullness of the story really comes about at the end, after each person has looked back over his own life in the last half a century or so. Each of these people have things in their lives that they've given up or kept, and now look back on the choices they've made. Not surprisingly, Jack's death has made them all very aware of their own lives past, present and future.A fine, fine novel, one that I'm happy to put on my 2007 favorites list. I recommend it highly, but to patient readers who want something they can take away from their reading experience. This is literature, not just a book.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Of all the fiction books I have read (including others by Swift) that attempt to pull off the changing view point (I sure English majors have a better word...) this is the master of the genre. All of the characters were interesting, the story was fantastic and full of surprises. The movie is worth watching (this surprised me) but only after you have read the book first.