Last Orders - (Vintage International) by Graham Swift (Paperback)

About the Book

Swift's first novel since his highly acclaimed Ever After is a subtle yet piercing story about the ways in which friendship and love are shaped by the past and by fate. At its center is a group of men, friends since the Second World War, whose lives revolve around work, family, the racetrack, and their favorite pub. When one of the group dies, the survivors are compelled to take stock.

Book Synopsis

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. As they drive towards the fulfillment of their mission, their errand becomes an extraordinary journey into their collective and individual pasts. Braiding these men's voices, and that of Jack's widow, into a choir of sorrow and resentment, passion and regret, Swift creates a testament to a changing England and to enduring mortality.

"Swift has involved us in real, lived lives...Quietly, but with conviction, he seeks to affirm the values of decency, loyalty, love."--New York Review of Books

"A beautiful book...a novel that speaks profoundly of human need and tenderness. Even the most cynical will be warmed by it."--San Francisco Chronicle

Review Quotes

"A profound, intricately stratified novel full of life, love lost and love enduring." -- The Globe and Mail

"Swift is surely one of England's finest living novelists.... The tale he tells is as affecting as it is convincing.... Quietly, but with conviction, he seeks to reaffirm the values of decency, loyalty, love." -- The New York Review of Books

About the Author

Graham Swift is the author of five other novels, including the acclaimed Waterland, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and won the Guardian Fiction Award. His work has been translated into more than twenty languages. He lives in London.