Rating: 
Summary: You won't be able to guess....
Review: This book is one that keeps you up at night. It's interesting how she takes two people and "rewinds" their life, as opposed to the usual moving forward. I have to admit the last third of the book was a surprise, she did a good job of keeping the reader guessing.
Rating: 
Summary: An interesting, painful narrative
Review: I can understand the reviewers who feel betrayed by the end of this novel, since it DOES draw the reader in and make them feel connected to the characters. The ending feels like a terrible betrayal of human opportunity and possibility. I think, however, that that is exactly the point that Shreve was trying to make. The characters are lost here, before they even get a chance to begin, and the loss of them and their wise and weak human longings and choices is painful. This novel has a lot of echoes of other Shreve novels--there is a strong sense of place, as in The Pilot's Wife and The Weight of Water, and the sense of passion as such a powerful force that it distorts logic is similar to what the characters face in Fortune's Rocks and Where of When, which this novel resembles in many ways. This certainly won't make me want to stop reading Anita Shreve's work (in fact, I have Sea Glass waiting for me on my large pile of books to be read), but I am waiting to see what she does next and to see if she can come up with someting that omoves beyond the territory she has very painstakingly carved out for herself.
Rating: 
Summary: No More Shreve For Me
Review: I was looking forward to reading this latest novel of Anita Shreves. I loved Strange Fits of Passion, but this story doesn't even come close to that. As other reviewers here have said, it took a while to become involved in the story line, and the chapters that took place in Africa were sometimes grueling to get through. But, because I liked Linda and Thomas I plowed through the boring parts expecting the book to have a plausable ending (who would have thought it wouldn't?). The ending was, to say the least, a shock, and not at all plausable. I also agree with a reviewer here who stated that this was a "mean trick to play on the reader". Was that Shreve's purpose? Did she want to have readers sit staring at the last page totally dumbfounded. Like another of the reviewers, I am also a mental health professional, and I have to ask myself, why would an well-loved author play a nasty trick like this?
Rating: 
Summary: great ride, crash ending
Review: Wow! I was so drawn in and involved with the characters as I was reading, only to be shocked and dismayed by the ending. Frustrated! I completely agree with "Speechless's" review below, and I won't be reading another Shreve. Dang.
Rating: 
Summary: huh?
Review: This book would have been a five in my eyes if it wasn't for the last paragraph. I am very confused by the ending, because I can seem to find any hints to it earlier in the novel - it's as though she just couldn't think of an ending. I wish it had ended another way instead of what seems to be a copy of a some-what recent movie where the ending produced much better results
Rating:
Summary: For those who have been in love...
Review: As soon as I began reading this book I knew it was for me. I am 18, near the age of the two lovers at the end (start) of the story, and I am still getting over someone whom I knew was the one. Once I learned that Linda and Thomas had been lovers entangled forever, I immideiately could relate. I am a whiny poet type, and thus I also could relate to Thomas and Linda. Those are the main reasons I fell in love with this novel. I also love the stucture of the book, beginning at the end and ending at the beginning, the style of Shreve's writing, a thick prose that seems poetic at points, and the cover. (I mean HELLO) it is the most beautiful book cover I have ever seen. well, I shouldn't judge this book by its cover, but what is on the inside of this book was almost as good. I reccommend this book wholeheartedly to anyone who has lost a lover whether it be their death, a breakup, etc. I really enjoyed this book and I hope you do too.
Rating:
Summary: Borrrrrring!
Review: I found this to be a totally insipid novel about two whiners. I had to force myself to finish it. The last page was the most interesting. I read The Weight of Water and liked it better than this story - even though I found Thomas to be self-centered. I won't be reading another Shreeve novel. The characters are egocentric and uninteresting. What a waste of time and money.
Rating:
Summary: Glad I'm not the only one confused by the ending.
Review: After reading these reviews, I'm no closer to completely understanding the ending to a book that I otherwise enjoyed. I was hoping to get more clues from the reviews, guess I'll read it again to see what I missed.
Rating:
Summary: Speechless
Review: I am still in such shock from the end of this book that I can hardly think of words to describe it.
I could not put this book down. While I found the first hundred pages difficult to understand, I was enthralled with Linda and Thomas as the book took you back through their lives together. I fell in love with them both.
However, as I started nearing the end, and the pages were dwindling, I started to fear that there was no way the book could come to any kind of closure within the very few remaining pages - I was right - sadly!
I feel totally floored by the ending, and I am unbelievably disappointed. While I don't think the ending was a copout, I feel unfulfilled by a book that up until the end was very fulfilling!
Poor Thomas, living with demons. But, more so, poor reader who will be manipulated into loving these characters only to realize that they were lost before they began.
I saw the movie the Sixth Sense and I left there feeling satisfied - I have finished this book - and while the ending was essentially the same, I feel betrayed.
The characters are stolen from you - and they are endearing characters. I can only liken it to realizing, while reading Bridges of Madison Country, that the love affair was merely in Francesca's mind, and that Robert didn't really exist.
I can't recommend this book - at least not until I get over the great loss I feel at this forsaken ending.
Rating:
Summary: A compulsive read, couldn't put it down!
Review: As a fast reader, I like to have a wide variety of novels to hand but on this occasion decided to try an author new to me. I usually stear clear of romances or any story that might be labelled as such yet once I started reading 'The Last Time They Met', I couldn't put it down.Having no previous experience of Anita Shreve's work, I was not comparing it as other reviewers seem to have down and found it compulsive...perhaps because it echoed my own past? This is a marvellous novel containing all the elements and frustrations of lost love seen through the lives of Linda and Thomas with which so many of us can sympathise but without over-sentimentality. The tri-part structure, which does not follow the usual chronological or flash-back pattern, concentrates the mind and the simple human touches keep the reader enthralled.The ending is,as with all successfuI novels,a shock!I even re-read the last pages to make sure that I had not made a mistake.This is one of the few books that I have read more than twice, need I say more!
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