The Last Girls [Paperback]

Lee Smith (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: Ballantine Books; Later Printing edition (2003)
• ASIN: B000OVXTYE
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.4 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (70 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,688,766 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars "The Girls" meet "The Group", March 18, 2008

By 

Red Rock Bookworm (St. George Utah) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Last Girls (Ballantine Reader's Circle) (Paperback)

Can events experienced early in women's lives really have an effect, either constructive or noxious, on the rest of their lives? This is the primary question address by author Lee Smith in her novel The Last Girls.

In 1966, five Southern college "girls" take a rafting trip down the Mississippi River. Now, 30 years later, they have come together once again to re-enact that fateful trip. The primary difference is that on this trip their mode of transportation is a luxurious steamboat and their primary reason for coming together is to journey to New Orleans and scatter the ashes of one of their fellow rafters, "Baby". As the steamboat trip progresses each "girl" (Harriet, Courtney, Catherine and Anna) reminisces about their days at college, the choices they have made over the ensuing years, and the influence Baby has had on each of their lives right down to the dreams they have either pursued or abandoned.

The raft trip appears to be a metaphor for the trip of discovery that each of us experiences as we "sail" through life, complete with the detours taken in an attempt to avoid crashing on the rocks, the effects of a rough trip on our perceptions, and the enjoyment experienced during those periods of smooth sailing.

Lee Smith has managed to capture the essence of what many women experience as they grow older. At some point each one of us explores the memories that have been tempered by time, revisits all of our youthful desires as well as acknowledging the compromises we've made, have accepted the reality of life while continuing to enjoy the fantasy world of romance novels, and ultimately we have searched for an answer to the question of the relevance of our lives.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Disappointed in Lee Smith, August 1, 2003

By 

tallybroom "tallybroom" (Atlanta, GA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Last Girls (Hardcover)

I am a huge fan of Lee Smith and I loved Saving Grace and Oral History and so I was eager to read the Last Girls, especially because I read that it was based on a real experience in Smith's life (a raft trip down the Mississippi with college friends in homage to Huck Finn). I was terribly disappointed with how stock each of the characters turned out to be. They are more "types" of an early sixties coed than real women. There is the society princess, the future librarian, the girl who does not quite fit in and so remakes herslf to suit the circumstances and, of course, dwarfing them all in their colorless lives: the beautiful, the tragic, the talented and the promiscuous Baby.

The best part of the book comes at mile 364.2. This whole chapter is about Catherine's third husband Russell Hurt, an attorney who drinks more than he should, loves his wife deeply and well and has a peculiar fascination with the Weather Channel. He is funny, likeable, flawed and, at least in this one chapter, the most fully realized character in the whole book. It is worth reading just for Russell.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good book, but....., January 9, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: The Last Girls (Hardcover)

I always enjoy Lee Smith's novels and The Last Girls was no exception. Finished it in less than 24 hours. However I kept getting the feeling that the book was written in a hurry, or at least edited in a hurry. There was at least one mispelling that I noticed, inconsistant time references, and (as one other reviewer pointed out) several minor characters had the exact same traits or backgrounds. Though I enjoyed the story, I kept getting caught up in these details and had a hard time focusing on it. I hope that I had just purchased the early edition, with these errors being corrected in a second printing, but I did find this rather disappointing.