Rating: 
Summary: Friendship over time
Review: Last Orders by Graham Swift is to date my favorite book. The author's ability to capture the essence of the frienship between the men is riveting. Swift explores the changes that their friendship goes through over time yet still remains strong. His brilliant command of language and unique point of view narration will make any reader rethink their relationships with all their friends.
The writing style is a bit jumpy and difficult to understand at the beginning but the reader gets used to it and the message of the book is worth the effort.
Rating: 
Summary: A very solid book
Review: Last Orders tells (as has been adequately summarized elsewhere on the page) the story of group of friends taking their dead friend's ashes to the sea. Ray is the primary voice of the present in the novel, but the book shifts between all party members' POV of past events between them. The novel is very well woven, with the texture of reality flashing beautifully in the look at the decisions people make and the lives they lead.I recently read an interview with Swift where he said he thought that there was too much circularity between the media culture and the modern novel and talked about how much he respected writers like Faulkner, and while I agree with that, I missed a certain circularity with *something* in Last Orders. It was such a beautiful little self-contained world, and for me that was both its strongest and weakest point. It may well be that not being British I miss the larger context of the book (wheras when I read Faulkner the whole sense of southern history inflects the reading experience) or it may just be that my taste runs towards more things that while not as perfect, reach farther. I don't know. But for me, as much as I admire the book, it doesn't reach to the five star level.
Rating:
Summary: "Last Orders" provides a first-order reflection of life.
Review: Last Orders, winner of the Booker Prize, is the latest offering from award-winning author Graham Swift. In this brisk read, four friends are driving across England to carry out the last orders of their deceased friend, Jack Dodds, scattering his ashes into the sea. Unique in Last Orders is the narrative perspective. Each character, most of whom are friends since World War II, offer insights to Jack's life, their individual pasts, and the collective history of the group. Within this social group, Swift explores the issues of life, death, love, regret, opportunities, and even luck. Last Orders also comments on the changing face of England as a new generation takes its place in society. Ray, who is recently divorced, is Jack's best friend, having met in the desert war against Germany. It is at this time that Ray also meets Jack's wife Amy -albeit through a photograph in Jack's wallet. For most of his life, Ray secretly admires Amy from afar,even meeting her profoundly retarded daughter on one occasion, the one thing Jack could never bring himself to do. Amy, Jack Dodd's still-beautiful wife, is mysteriously absent from the cross-country jaunt to put Jack to rest. She prefers instead to not miss her regular Thursday visit with her daughter June. Vince is Jack's and Amy's adopted son,having lost his family to a rural bombing raid in World War II when he was still an infant. While Jack, the master butcher, hopes to pass on the family trade to him, Vince has his own dreams to pursue. Vic is the undertaker. Even though he does not share the others' army heritage -having served instead in the navy- he is the one member of the group everyone hopes dies last. His views of life and death are both profound and poignant. Lenny is perhaps most representative of the passing generation, having been a boxer in his youth. Now older and much slower, he vainly takes on Vince -who has spurned both Lenny's daughter in love and Jack Dodds in life. Last Orders is a wonderful novel. At times, the novel is light-hearted and funny, others warm, and occasionally sad. Swift has a gift for taking the reader by the hand and leading him or her through the emotional forest of his characters. Rich with symbolism and told in elegant prose, the book is divided into short chapters that make it easy to pick up and put down without feeling obligated to immediately push through to the end. Rather, Swift invites the reader to join the group in their journey and learn, not only about the group alone, but also about the human condition as a whole. While I highly recommend Last Orders, there are a few things to be aware of before joining the ride. The story is set in England and non-England readers may find themselves lost among the many references to prominent features of the landscape, social customs, cities and locales, and language. Occasional use of British slang can cause a stumble for the reader, but not enough to deter. The only awkward aspect is Swift's style of handling dialog, introducing a character's words always, and only, with "...says." For example: "He says, 'I want you to lend me some cash.' I say, 'Cash?' He says, 'Cash.' I say, 'You need cash?'" This style is the only shortfall and is more a matter of personal preference than literary critique. I highly recommend Last Orders to any reader.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating layers--like a sweet onion
Review: Learning to know the characters was part of the fascination of the book. The farther I read, the more I understood who and why they were. And I finally understood that this was about people making choices and getting stuck in them. I was left with intriguing questions which read the book again. I rarely do that! Swift's word pictures are memorable--the four men walking single file, carrying the box
Rating:
Summary: a poetic an affectionate storytelling
Review: Many a review recommends a book because of it beeing "unputdownable". Last Orders is of that rare sort that will make the reader find himself putting it down now and again for a while just to think - and then read on all the more absorbed by it. By use of a simple yet poetic language, Swift succeeds brilliantly in giving us access to the life of those working-class people. His portraits are vivid sketches that make us rethink our daily way of judging each other's weaknesses. In each and every chapter, he convincingly conveys to us the depth and drama behind the surface of simple, ordinary people. This is truely a rich book to be discovered.
Rating:
Summary: Friendship over time
Review: Part way through the book, I paused and thought about these messed-up lives and unexpressed emotions, then it occurred to me that these guys are just like everyone I know. To me, this is why I found the voices so authentic. I am Vince's age and shared his attitude toward those of his father's generation. There is little narration and much stream of conscious thinking which makes the book, at times, hard to follow. Develop a score card of characters and relationships early since it does get confusing. Ultimately the four stars are for the implicit language which limits the scope of the book somewhat. Although the dialog is onviously authentic, I know that I missed some things since I am not from the neighborhood and the dialog almost assumes that a reader must be from nearby.
Rating:
Summary: Post Modern Authentic
Review: Part way through the book, I paused and thought about these messed-up lives and unexpressed emotions, then it occurred to me that these guys are just like everyone I know. To me, this is why I found the voices so authentic. I am Vince's age and shared his attitude toward those of his father's generation. There is little narration and much stream of conscious thinking which makes the book, at times, hard to follow. Develop a score card of characters and relationships early since it does get confusing. Ultimately the four stars are for the implicit language which limits the scope of the book somewhat. Although the dialog is onviously authentic, I know that I missed some things since I am not from the neighborhood and the dialog almost assumes that a reader must be from nearby.
Rating:
Summary: Masterfully Written Booker Prize Winner
Review: Ray, an aging punter whose wife left him years ago, sits at the bar of the Coach and Horses pub in Bermondsey. "It aint like your regular sort of day . . . That's why I'm here, five minutes after opening, for a little silent pow-wow with a pint glass." Ray is joined by his long-time friend, Lenny, and then by Vic, who arrives carrying a box. "He twists the box round so we can see there's a white card sellotaped to one side. There's a date and a number and name: Jack Arthur Dodds." These three friends are soon joined by another, Vince, to scatter the remains of a man they have known since World War II. Thus begins "Last Orders," Graham Swift's masterfully written Booker Prize winning novel about the day that four old friends carry out the final wish of Jack Dodds, scattering his remains into the surging ocean at the Margate pier. Along the way, driving from Bermondsey to Margate in a big old Mercury, with stops at a naval memorial in Chatham, the Canterbury Cathedral, and a few more pubs, we learn the intimate history of their lives, their friendships and their unfulfilled dreams. "Last Orders" is written in language that brilliantly captures the thoughts, the feelings and the unfulfilled yearnings of its characters, that vividly paints a picture of the subtle, yet profound, ways in which ordinary lives become intertwined and meaningful. It is a novel marked by humor, but also by a subdued, bittersweet melancholy. While written in the first person, the voices are ever-shifting as the narrative moves from character to character, place to place, backward and forward in time. It is a remarkable narrative achievement, but also one that demands the reader's utmost attention.
Rating:
Summary: Masterfully Written Booker Prize Winner
Review: Ray, an aging punter whose wife left him years ago, sits at the bar of the Coach and Horses pub in Bermondsey. "It aint like your regular sort of day . . . That's why I'm here, five minutes after opening, for a little silent pow-wow with a pint glass." Ray is joined by his long-time friend, Lenny, and then by Vic, who arrives carrying a box. "He twists the box round so we can see there's a white card sellotaped to one side. There's a date and a number and name: Jack Arthur Dodds." These three friends are soon joined by another, Vince, to scatter the remains of a man they have known since World War II. Thus begins "Last Orders," Graham Swift's masterfully written Booker Prize winning novel about the day that four old friends carry out the final wish of Jack Dodds, scattering his remains into the surging ocean at the Margate pier. Along the way, driving from Bermondsey to Margate in a big old Mercury, with stops at a naval memorial in Chatham, the Canterbury Cathedral, and a few more pubs, we learn the intimate history of their lives, their friendships and their unfulfilled dreams. "Last Orders" is written in language that brilliantly captures the thoughts, the feelings and the unfulfilled yearnings of its characters, that vividly paints a picture of the subtle, yet profound, ways in which ordinary lives become intertwined and meaningful. It is a novel marked by humor, but also by a subdued, bittersweet melancholy. While written in the first person, the voices are ever-shifting as the narrative moves from character to character, place to place, backward and forward in time. It is a remarkable narrative achievement, but also one that demands the reader's utmost attention.
Rating:
Summary: Don't let the structure put you off
Review: Reading Graham Swift's Last Orders took me back to Faulkner's Sound and the Fury. Specifically, the shifting narrators and the gradual unfolding of the story/stories. Faulkner's characters confused us by changing their names or sharing names with other characters. Swift's book clues us in with the name of the character heading the chapters, alternating with the destinations along the way to Margate, where Jack has requested his ashes be strewn along the pier, or was it the jetty?I read this book at bedtime for less than a week, staying up too late each night, hesitant to let go of it. I marvelled at the complexity of the characters, at the author's ability to enunciate different voices and recount various histories all in appropriate first person. Immense talent! I'm still thinking about these characters weeks later. I found it profoundly moving and rich.
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