The Last Time I Saw You, Elizabeth Berg
The Last Time I Saw You, Elizabeth Berg
7 Rating(s)
List: $17.50 | Sale: $12.25
Club: $8.75

The Last Time I Saw You

Author: Elizabeth Berg

Narrator: Elizabeth Berg

Unabridged: 8 hr 42 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 04/06/2010


Synopsis

From the beloved bestselling author of Home Safe and The Year of Pleasures, comes a wonderful new novel about women and men reconnecting with one another—and themselves—at their fortieth high school reunion.

To each of the men and women in The Last Time I Saw You, this reunion means something different—a last opportunity to say something long left unsaid, an escape from the bleaker realities of everyday life, a means to save a marriage on the rocks, or an opportunity to bond with a slightly estranged daughter, if only over what her mother should wear.

As the onetime classmates meet up over the course of a weekend, they discover things that will irrevocably affect the rest of their lives. For newly divorced Dorothy Shauman, the reunion brings with it the possibility of finally attracting the attention of the class heartthrob, Pete Decker. For the ever self-reliant, ever left-out Mary Alice Mayhew, it’s a chance to reexamine a painful past. For Lester Heseenpfeffer, a veterinarian and widower, it is the hope of talking shop with a fellow vet—or at least that’s what he tells himself. For Candy Armstrong, the class beauty, it’s the hope of finding friendship before it is too late.

As Dorothy, Mary Alice, Lester, Candy, and the other classmates converge for the reunion dinner, four decades melt away: Desires and personalities from their youth reemerge, and new discoveries are made. For so much has happened to them all. And so much can still happen.

In this beautiful novel, Elizabeth Berg deftly weaves together stories of roads taken and not taken, choices made and opportunities missed, and the possibilities of second chances.

About Elizabeth Berg

Elizabeth Berg is the New York Times bestselling author of many novels, including The Year of Pleasures, The Art of Mending, Say When, True to Form, Never Change, and Open House, which was an Oprah’s Book Club selection in 2000. Durable Goods and Joy School were selected as ALA Best Books of the Year, and Talk Before Sleep was short-listed for the ABBY award in 1996. The winner of the 1997 New England Booksellers Award for her body of work, Berg is also the author of a nonfiction work, Escaping Into the Open: The Art of Writing True. She lives in Chicago.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Louise on May 16, 2010

I've read every single book that Berg has written and I found this one to be a bit silly to be quite honest. A bunch of old high school classmates get together for their 40th Reunion which will be their last one. The characters in this novel seemed somewhat juvenile instead of mature people who are n......more

Goodreads review by Melissa on October 02, 2011

Okay, I will read ANYTHING Berg puts out. ANYTHING. I have been a fan since the very beginning and always will be. I race to get her newest book. With that being said, this book was fluff. A good fluff, but fluff none the less. Her earlier works, such as Talk Before Sleep, Joy School and Range of Mo......more

Goodreads review by Girls Gone Reading on June 26, 2010

The Last Time I Saw You was not the most influential book that I have read this year, but I don’t think that was Elizabeth Berg’s intention. Berg didn’t focus on racism in the South (The Help) or government produced vampires (The Passage). No. Berg just wrote about what it is like to feel younger th......more

Goodreads review by Deborah on April 10, 2010

Elizabeth Berg is like the little girl with a curl. When she's good, she's very very good, and this is a perfect example. It's a simple story: five people going to their fortieth high school reunion. Berg must be a fan of "The Breakfast Club" because she gives us the typical high school stereotypes:......more

Goodreads review by Erin on April 16, 2010

Although I generally like Berg's work, I hesitated to pick up this book because the subject of 40-year high school reunions was not that much of a draw for me. However, after attending an author reading and book signing, the snippets she read aloud were enough to draw me in. I found it to be typical......more


Quotes

“[Berg] has a knack for taking you right into the soul of her characters, as they respond to joy and tragedy in a perfectly imperfect way.”—Chicago Sun-Times

“A warm, unsentimental look at life way past high school—and the hope some people hold of reliving those glory days.”—People (four stars)

“For the delightful hours it takes to read this novel, it seems that the characters jumped right off the page and joined the crowd for a casual family supper.”—Chicago Tribune

“Marvelous . . . plenty of pathos and can’t-stop-laughing moments . . . Readers will care about every character.”—The Oklahoman
 
“Book groups are clamoring for upbeat yet significant works that are entertaining as well as enlightening; Berg’s latest novel satisfies and succeeds on both counts.”—Booklist