One Last Lunch, Erica Heller
One Last Lunch, Erica Heller
List: $24.99 | Sale: $17.50
Club: $12.49

One Last Lunch
A Final Meal with Those Who Meant So Much to Us

Author: Erica Heller

Narrator: Kim Niemi, Paul Woodson

Unabridged: 11 hr 6 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 07/09/2024


Synopsis

In this heartwarming essay collection, dozens of authors, actors, artists, and others imagine one last lunch with someone they cherished.

A few years ago, Erica Heller realized how universal the longing is for one more moment with a lost loved one. It could be a parent, a sibling, a mentor, or a friend, but who wouldn't love the opportunity to sit down, break bread, and just talk? Who wouldn't jump at the chance to ask those unasked questions, or share those unvoiced feelings?

In One Last Lunch, Heller has asked friends and family of authors, artists, musicians, comedians, actors, and others, to recount one such fantastic repast.

Muffie Meyer and her documentary subject Little Edie Beale go to a deli in Montreal. Kirk Douglas asks his father what he thought of him becoming an actor. Sara Moulton dines with her friend Julia Child. The Anglican priest George Pitcher has lunch with Jesus. And Heller herself connects with her father, the renowned author Joseph Heller.

These richly imagined stories are endlessly revealing, about the subject, the writer, the passage of time, regret, gratitude, and the power of enduring love.

About Erica Heller

Erica Heller is the daughter of Joseph Heller, the author of Catch-22. An advertising copywriter, novelist, and creative consultant, her work has appeared in the New York Observer and on the Huffington Post. She lives in New York City at the ever-evolving Apthorp apartment building.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Richard on April 12, 2020

"This isn't what I expected," I found myself mumbling to myself early into Erica Heller's intriguingly titled "One Last Lunch: A Final Meal With Those Who Meant So Much To Us." A few pages later, I found myself mumbling "I'm just not connecting with this at all," a fact that I found exasperating as......more

Goodreads review by Suzi on February 20, 2021

What a worthwhile book and idea for a book / discussion. The lunches with Amanda Cross (Carolyn Heilbrun) and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis were wonderful. Just what I needed on a stay-at-home-no-vaccin- in-sight weekend. Lovely idea and excellent execution (Goops, wrong word!)......more

Goodreads review by Jennifer on July 26, 2020

FYI: I won this book on goodreads.com. Some of the "Last Lunches" were unique, but many were similar. Many of the lunches were about people I was unfamiliar with, which is no fault of the author, but my deficit. I found the book long and had to struggle a bit to finish it.......more

Goodreads review by Judith on August 08, 2020

A good read, but an uneven one, but perhaps that is the nature of the various experiences told in very short chapters by all those meeting up with their person of choice for "one last lunch." Some are bittersweet and disappointing, others are marvelous. My favorite was probably Dahlia Lithwick's ver......more

Goodreads review by Gilion on December 12, 2020

One Last Lunch: A Final Meal with Those Who Meant So Much to Us by Erica Heller is a collection of essays from 49 people all imagining a final meal with a loved one who has passed away. Contributors include children, friends, acquaintances, and professional colleagues of writers, actors, and other w......more