The Last Goodbye by Fiona Lucas: As Anna counts the months and days since her beloved husband Spencer was 
cruelly taken from her, she struggles to find any joy beyond the safety of her doona and the walls she has built around herself. Despite genuine attempts by her best friend Gabi to get her out and living again, Anna wants nothing more then to wrap herself in her grief and exist in her tormented world of dead hopes and dead dreams. Against her will, Gabi drags her out on New Year’s Eve and in a cutsie way introduces her to Jeremy, a hot single guy who momentarily captures Anna’s imagination before her grief crashes in and erupts epically in Gabi’s face.
Fleeing to the safety of her home, Anna’s broken heart takes the wheel and manipulates her into dialling Spencer’s number knowing she would hear his voice on the message bank – except of course, someone answers and answers her desperate ‘I love you’ with a ‘I beg your pardon’ – the same line her and Spencer shared from the beginning of their relationship.
Scared, confused and drunk, Anna passes out fitfully in her spare bedroom and the following night, surmises that she needs to call the number again knowing she may well be entirely insane. Thankfully she isn’t, and Brody answers with the reasonable explanation that the phone company has now passed on Spencer’s number. And irrespective of the bitter disappointment Anna feels, Brody and their phone calls quickly become a survival habit given he too is suffering in a dark world punctuated by grief and self-hatred.
Interestingly, Lucas explored the complexity of family, particularly the pitfalls of trying to maintain a relationship in the milieu of emotion that sits around being the daughter in-law and therefore, to a certain extent, bonded by, yet separate to, the familys’ experience of losing their brother or son as opposed to a husband. The natural questions of ‘what if’ and the dark demons that dangle the ‘should ofs’ at whim, to compound the grief all the more were well orchestrated, along with the human tendency to blame ourselves when we survive because we never feel truly entitled to live in the absence of the other, and most definitely not feel any joy or happiness. In this sense, Anna was simply likeable, honest, raw, trying. And similarly, Brody was the same; wise, patient and unable to live his life beyond the confines of his isolated cottage as he simply didn’t believe he deserved to be amongst people. And together they provided more for each other than simply a voice at the end of a phone line.
Beautifully written, well constructed, and well paced, this is a gorgeous romance that dives into the depths of darkness to tackle the suffocating nature of grief and the world that is navigated when it simply hurts to breathe. And whilst it was always likely going to head in the one direction, there was something powerful about the potential for two people to find each other in such unlikely ways and yet become the architecture for their individual healing and happiness. Simply, The Last Goodbye will resonate with anyone who has loved and survived, and likewise provide deep insight and empathy for those fortunate enough to have not experienced it.
Book Info:
Publication: 8th June 2021 | William Morrow Paperbacks |
Spencer was the love of Anna’s life: her husband, her best friend, her rock. She thought their love would last forever.
But three years ago, Spencer was tragically killed in an accident and Anna’s world was shattered. How can she ever move on, when she’s lost her soulmate?
On New Year’s Eve Anna calls Spencer’s phone number, just to hear his old voicemail greeting. But to her shock, someone answers…
Brody has inherited Spencer’s old number and is the first person who truly understands what Anna’s going through. As her and Brody’s phone calls become lengthier and more frequent, they begin opening up to each other—and slowly rediscover how to smile, how to laugh, even how to hope.
But Brody hasn’t been entirely honest with Anna. Will his secret threaten everything, just as it seems she might find the courage to love again?
