Helpful Score: 2
This book was "OK". I enjoyed getting to know the characters, which I thought were a little odd, but it sort of left me wanting to know more, as if something was missing. Not one of my most favorite reads, but it's an interesting story of old friends looking back at the past, and we see how their lives turned out after many years.
Helpful Score: 2
A Drama novel...I have a hard time staying focused on straight drama. It's about a group of girls and their lives through womanhood...romance, memories, etc.
Helpful Score: 2
I couldn't get into this book and only made it through the first 3 chapters.
Helpful Score: 1
Chic lit through and through...old college chums of a certain age going on a reunion cruise on an old-style river boat, renewing old friendships,new adventures, walking down memory lane...it is a good one.
Helpful Score: 1
Very good story, a 'road trip' on the river, for women who have reunited after 35 years of friendship. Though-provoking, a travelogue as well as sensitive, provocative story.
Helpful Score: 1
A good story, I listened to it on a long road trip and Lee Smith was again the wonderful story teller.
Helpful Score: 1
Rich and delicious....the story of four women....years ago, they were girls, not women---the last generation of American females to be called "girls"---who traveled down the Mississippi River...on a makeshift raft while they were on summer vacation...There were twelve of them on that rip; now there are these four, brought together by tragedy. One of their classmates...has died in an automobile wreck (was it really an accident?), and her husband has asked the old friends to re-create the river journey and scatter her ashes at the mouth of the Mississippi...It's a reunion of classmates with all of the in-between revealed in intimate detail, as only a skilled and classy storyteller can do it.
This book dragged on longer than a 27 episode miniseries. I was never quite sure who was who. Started out full of hope, but ended up sad.
This was a very slow moving story that really didn't develop well, it takes a group of girls from college that took a Huckleberry Finn trip down the Mississippi and are reliving it somewhat to spread the ashes of one of their friends.
It is the back and forth in time that is very confusing and disorienting to the reader.
Just don't understand how this became a New York Times Best Seller.
It is the back and forth in time that is very confusing and disorienting to the reader.
Just don't understand how this became a New York Times Best Seller.
Four former college roommates recreate a Mississippi River voyage to carry the ashes of a fifth friend to be scattered on the waters. Shifting backstories make the action hard to follow at times, but the biggest flaw was the open-ended conclusion, with each character facing a possibly life-altering choice.
Some reviewers instruct the new reader to sit back, relax and enjoy the trip. That being said, the author gives us a bit of a look at the bond of women who define themselves as friends to each other with the fierce loyalty and frank honesty long-time women friends have for each other
This is a semi-autobiographical novel with many similarities to the author's own past. Four women take a paddlewheel cruise down the Mississippi to scatter the ashes of one of their former classmates. The cruise repeats in part a raft trip taken thirty years ago by these women plus several others. The story goes between now (1990's) & back then. The characters are fully drawn, and the story shows the 60's lifestyle. There is a surprising amount of humor in some scenes. Some readers may enjoy looking back at 1966 & compare their lives with these women.
This book was selected for one of our book club reads. Normally I would this book was not the best for me and my reading type, however for a book club read I think it was a success. We enjoyed breaking down the characters and discussing plot. Overall I'm glad we picked this.
A great beach read! Girlfriends, you'll enjoy.
I loved this book. College friends meeting up years later to drop another roommates ashes off a steam boat. A trip that they had made when they were all in college. Love the characters. Great read
Lee Smith at her best.
The story of a most unusual \"class reunion\". Funny and memorable.
This is a great read. Nice oral history about a group of girls coming of age.
Moved a little slowly, story has a good basis.
It's like going to your reunion - only with better people on a fabulous adventure
Good book that develops characters from college to present life. The Last Girls is a term used from children of the 50's...they'd be called women now.
Four women travel down the Mississippi River on a journey of rememberance of friendships long ago. I enjoyed this book for the honesty insight it gives into life and relationships. Really a good read.
Awesome book. Very funny!!!
This book was entertaining.
Unabridged.
A really good read with terrific characters.
interesting read---
I really loved this book!I very worthwhile read!
About four women who meet up as a sort of reunion and sail down the Mississippi River. Personally I did not care for this book. The characters were very cliched, and the main woman was sort of depressing in my opinion. This book was recommended to me by my mom so maybe it fits her age group better than mine (early 20's) when I read it.
An honest portrait of intelligent, well-rounded southerners is always refreshing, and The Last Girls delivers. The book may be influenced by Twain, but Smith proves she has a voice of her own.
-USA Today
-USA Today
NY Times Best Seller - very engaging novel.
A story of 4 women reliving their adventure of rafting down the Mississippi River when they were in college. It's a reunion of classmates with all the in-between revealed in intimate detail that have evolved over the years.
I just couldn't get into this book although it was supposed to be good... o well...kinda slow at first...just didn't grab my attention maybe it will grab yours!?
In the brisk and readable The Last Girls, acclaimed Southern writer Lee Smith reunites four college suitemates on a boat tour of the mighty Mississippi. Thirty-five years before, inspired by reading Twain's Huckleberry Finn in class (a detail not nearly revisited enough), the women floated down the same river on a manmade raft; now they are gathered at the request of their recently deceased ringleader's husband. The story unfolds through the eyes of each woman as the old friends weave college memories with their own dramas spanning the three decades since graduation. Harriet, Courtney, Catherine, and Anna come through muddily compared to their dead friend Baby. Even in death, Baby, a Sylvia Plath-like creature with voracious appetites for poetry, self-mutilation, and sex, nearly overwhelms her more reticent friends with past behaviors better suited to a mental institution than a dorm room. As the tour boat bobs along in the wake of these women's emotional crises, Smith offers up the contemporary female life experience, fivefold. At its heart, this is a book about how we never quite outgrow the past, even after plenty of chances to do otherwise.
