[.ca] Last Chance Saloon (ISBN 0140271805)

From Amazon.com:
Desperately single thirtysomething men and women populate Keyes's breezy novel. Childhood friends Tara, Katherine, and Fintan muddle along, dealing with the indignities and inconveniences we all face--and then some. Tara's perfectly horrible, freeloading boyfriend Thomas watches her diet like a hawk and remarks cruelly on the size of her posterior, comparing her unfavorably to younger, thinner women. Katherine is a professional success, but her personal life is nonexistent. Every one of her prior relationships--six in all--has ended disastrously, with Katherine getting dumped. Each time, she retreats further and further into her shell, until her most intimate relationship is with her remote control. Fashion industry insider Fintan has found true love with his Italian boyfriend, Sandro, but a health crisis threatens their happiness. Tara, Katherine, and Fintan, as well as their quirky cast of friends (people with names like Lorcan and Mandii), live, love, and learn the hard way, the only way they can. Not quite as obsessive as Bridget Jones and that damn diary of hers, Keyes manages to convey a painfully accurate portrayal of what it means to be single today, tempered by a few of life's less humiliating and more important lessons, like the value of true friendship. Funny and irreverent, Keyes's Last Chance Saloon is a terrific vacation read. --Alison Trinkle

a fun read:
I picked up this book after reading Rachel's holiday, hoping to find another instant British style thriller. While I did enjoy this book, getting into the plot seemed to be my biggest problem and believing some of the events that occured was questionable. However, once I was engaged in the lives of these three friends, it became a blast to read!

Keyes does it again.:
Marian Keyes has struck again. Last Chance Saloon is yet another wonderful book, in a slew of greatness by Marian Keyes. Her ability to write real life drama is highlighted by this work. Meet Tara, Liv, Katherine and Fintan, all friends. They have a pretty simple life, enjoying themselves just as any other singles in their early thirties. But, things change, and something amongst this group of friends sparks this change. The way the four react and bond with one another, how they support one another, and how they live, is a beautiful vision of what friendship should be like. Their friendship is a deep, beautiful one, and its wonders are made very clear by Keyes. Her ability to write human reaction, characterizations and amazing situations is highlighted by Last Chance Saloon. Anyone who needs a pick-me-up, easy-to-read book with some meaning will enjoy Last Chance Saloon. If you are feeling a little bit low, this book will lift your spirits, and have you enjoying your life to the fullest. 6/10/02

Am I a hypocrite or what?:
I'm all for growth and change of an artist, but I was looking for the same brain candy I've gotten from other Keyes's books. This book had some of the same rollicking good fun as the other Keyes books I've read ("Lucy Sullivan is Getting Married" and "Watermelon"); however, I didn't enjoy "Last Chance Saloon" nearly as much. I felt like Keyes tried too hard to get deep and philosophical by addressing the issue of Fintan's health and focused too much on sending out the moral of 'carpe diem'. If you're after the latest misery of the month choice, stick with Oprah picks. If you're looking for fun and giggles, look to some of Keyes's other novels.

Life-long friends and life changing decisions...:
Finton, Katherine and Tara have been life-long friends! Finton works in the fashion industry and has the boyfriend of his dreams. Katherine is so consumed with her work that her guy-life... wait, she doesn't have a guy life. Tara has never NOT had a boyfriend and thinks she's happy with Thomas. But when Finton finds out he has cancer, he decides to force them into being happy. He wants Katherine to go out with the guy who's been flirting with her at work, to put her boundries down and go for it AND he wants Tara to dump Thomas, she can do better. The three friends learn from each other and start to conquer their fears so they can live life to it's fullest! This is a great book, Marian Keyes portrays Finton's illness in such an amazing way, as well as the emotional feats Katherine and Tara must deal with to honestly be happy.

Keyes' best yet!!:
Katherine, Fintan and Tara grew up together in the small coastal Clare town of Knockavoy, in the 1960s and 1970s; they're now all in their early thirties and living in London. Katherine's the only one not in a relationship, but she claims to be perfectly happy as she is - far happier than Tara, who's lived with Thomas for the last two years. Thomas is mean and cruel to Tara, but she won't leave him because, she insists, she's in the Last Chance Saloon. At her age, and with her overweight figure, she'll never find another man. Katherine thinks that no man is far better than one who isn't faithful or kind or loving; we gradually find out that she's had more than enough experience of the other kind. And that's why, when the handsome, charming and genuinely *nice* Joe Roth asks her out, she's needlessly cruel to him. Last chance saloon? She couldn't care less. Until suddenly it's *Fintan* - Fintan, the golden boy, blissfully happy with his boyfriend Sandro - who's really in the Last Chance Saloon. Fintan is very seriously ill - not with AIDS, thankfully, but with Hodgkin's Disease. And it's very possible that he might die... Suddenly, life begins to look very different to both Katherine and Tara, and they start to re-evaluate their priorities and what they want out of life. There are some wonderful secondary characters in this book, too: Sandro, Fintan's boyfriend; Joe Roth; Fintan's family, the O'Gradys - especially Milo; Liv, Katherine and Tara's former flatmate; and the egotistical Lorcan, whom we all want to see come a cropper before the end of the book. In this, as in so many ways, Last Chance Saloon is reminiscent of Maeve Binchy at her best. (Oh, and to the reviewer who thought the character names were odd: these are all quite normal Irish names). Ever since Watermelon, I've been waiting for Marian Keyes to write another book genuinely worth reading. I loved Watermelon: it was funny and poignant and romantic. Lucy Sullivan Is Getting Married was a mistake: it was juvenile and tedious. Rachel's Holiday was better, but it felt as if a serious subject was being trivialised - though that may have been the first-person narrative. Last Chance Saloon, however, at last shows what Keyes is really capable of. I preferred the third-person narrative in this book, and the fact that, as a result, Keyes gave us a rounded picture of both Katherine and Tara - a less rounded picture of Fintan, but then it was interesting to view him through others' eyes. In many ways, he is a pivotal character in the plot development. Next up: Sushi For Beginners, which I really hope is as good as this book! I think, in Marian Keyes, we may have found Maeve Binchy's successor for modern Ireland. wmr-uk