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    The Last Anniversary: A Summer Beach Read
    Unavailable
    The Last Anniversary: A Summer Beach Read
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    The Last Anniversary: A Summer Beach Read
    Ebook466 pages7 hours

    The Last Anniversary: A Summer Beach Read

    By Liane Moriarty

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    From Liane Moriarty, author of the #1 New York Times bestsellers Big Little Lies and Truly Madly Guilty, comes an unforgettable novel defined by her signature sharp wit, page-turning storyline, and lovable and eccentric characters.

    Sophie Honeywell always wondered if Thomas Gordon was the one who got away. He was the perfect boyfriend, but on the day he was going to propose, she broke his heart. A year later he married his travel agent, while Sophie has been mortifyingly single ever since. Now Thomas is back in her life because Sophie has unexpectedly inherited his aunt Connie's house on Scribbly Gum Island—home of the famously unsolved Munro Baby mystery.

    Sophie moves onto the island and begins a new life as part of an unconventional family, where it seems everyone has a secret. Grace, a beautiful young mother, is feverishly planning a shocking escape from her perfect life. Margie, a frumpy housewife, has made a pact with a stranger, while dreamy Aunt Rose wonders if maybe it's about time she started making her own decisions.

    As Sophie's life becomes increasingly complicated, she discovers that sometimes you have to stop waiting around—and come up with your own fairy-tale ending.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateApr 20, 2010
    ISBN9780062008671
    Unavailable
    The Last Anniversary: A Summer Beach Read
    Author

    Liane Moriarty

    Liane Moriarty is the author of the #1 New York Times bestsellers Big Little Lies, The Husband’s Secret, and Truly Madly Guilty; the New York Times bestsellers Nine Perfect Strangers, What Alice Forgot, and The Last Anniversary; The Hypnotist’s Love Story; and Three Wishes. She lives in Sydney, Australia, with her husband and two children.

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    Reviews for The Last Anniversary

    3.5/5

    625 ratings52 reviews

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    • 4/5
      There were some great characters in this novel - and there were some serious topics addressed as well. I felt such compassion and fear for Grace, and empathy for Sophie, and admiration for Margie. The revelation of secrets at the end of the book was satisfying without wrapping everyone up in a bow - and there was that last big surprise that Ms. Moriarty specializes in.
    • 4/5
      There's always a secret-and it's not always JUST the one you were reading to discover. Delicious.
    • 5/5
      As usual, just great! I love the way she deals with each and every character in this rather large collection of people and how they all interrelate. She is such a great story teller in all of her books. I am looking forward to her newest one, already out in Australia, The Husband's Secret, which I happen to have a copy of right here in my hands---happiness!!
    • 3/5
      I enjoyed this one on audio. The story was a little bit predictable but I still had fun listening. The characters were all a bit quirky and everything wrapped up nicely. I LOVED Heather Wilds voice as she changed from character to character. 3.5 ⭐️
    • 4/5
      This was a fun story. I really enjoy the way Moriarty develops her characters, as the story itself unfolds. I didn't have any real suspicions or inklings about the truth behind the Alice & Jack Monroe story.... I was pleasantly surprised by the way the whole story wrapped up.
    • 2/5
      I liked the other two books of hers I read, but this one was HORRIBLE. I didn't care about the characters at all...
    • 4/5
      I'm going to give this one 3.5 stars actually. I have come to love Liane Moriarty books but this one isn't at the top of my favorites. It took me longer to get into this book and I kept feeling that I just wanted to be done with it. It drags a little and has too many different characters perspectives. I did enjoy the surprise at the end involving Rose, it made the read worth it!
    • 3/5
      Not as snarky and funny as Moriarty's other books but still a very engaging and entertaining story.
    • 4/5
      I just love Liane Moriarty's writing, she always has a little unexpected twist at the end of her stories that make me either laugh or gasp out loud, so clever! I listened to the audio version of this book and found it excellent with the Australian accent of the narrator. All the characters in this book are well developed and one can empathize with all of them. I'm a huge Liane Moriarty fan and she does not disappoint with this book. Highly recommended.
    • 3/5
      I somehow stumbled across this book, and picked it up to read between some other obligatory books, which were either darker, more serious, or non-fiction. This presented a good diversionary read, with characters I liked (though I kept getting the family tree all bolloxed up). So great moments/twists in the book, as characters reveal themselves, but my favorite came at the very end of the book. Can't say more without a spoiler.
    • 3/5
      Sophie Honeywell always wondered if Thomas Gordon was the one who got away. He was the perfect boyfriend, but on the day he was going to propose, she broke his heart. A year later he married his travel agent, while Sophie has been mortifyingly single ever since. Now Thomas is back in her life because Sophie has unexpectedly inherited his aunt Connie's house on Scribbly Gum Island—home of the famously unsolved Munro Baby mystery.Sophie moves onto the island and begins a new life as part of an unconventional family, where it seems everyone has a secret. Grace, a beautiful young mother, is feverishly planning a shocking escape from her perfect life. Margie, a frumpy housewife, has made a pact with a stranger, while dreamy Aunt Rose wonders if maybe it's about time she started making her own decisions.As Sophie's life becomes increasingly complicated, she discovers that sometimes you have to stop waiting around—and come up with your own fairy-tale ending.
    • 5/5
      Love all of her books but this one wins the cake for humor. It is as usually a book full of interesting characters. A woman inherits a house on an island. She doesn't know the woman very well but she was dating the woman's grandson at one time. He is now married. His wife has a baby. The woman who inherits dates 2 men. She is in love with another married man. The island makes money by showing a house where a couple left their child 75 years before and vanished into thin air. The characters are fantastic and Sophie Honeywell (the main character) is humorous.
    • 4/5
      What if?Sophie Honeywell lives in Sydney and is left a house on Scribbly Gum Island by the Aunt of her ex-boyfriend. Poor Sophie, almost 40, without boyfriend or child. Part murder mystery (the island shot to fame due to an abandoned child), part chick lit.The novel could have been 50+ pages shorter, however, I loved the authors snarky comments!
    • 5/5
      Liane Moriarty is one of my favorite authors. This is the fourth book of hers I’ve read (although it’s the second one she’s written) and it did not disappoint. The Last Anniversary is a wonderful blend of mystery, serious issues and humor like her other books I’ve read.Sophie is thirty-nine years old and can hear her biological clock ticking quite loudly. She’s starting to wonder if she should have broken up with her almost fiancé Thomas when one day he calls her out of the blue. He tells her that his Aunt Connie, who Sophie had barely known, has died and left Sophie her house on Scribbly Gum Island to her. Scribbly Gum Island is famous for being the place where the Munroe baby was found abandoned and Sophie just happens to be a huge fan of that story. She’s excited to be moving onto the island, where the Monroe Baby, now an adult, and her family live.Sophie is welcomed by most of the family with open arms. The family members each have their own unique struggles and the narration switches back and forth between Sophie and various members of the family. I was completely drawn in to each person’s story, particularly Grace’s. Grace is a new mom who, to the reader, is obviously struggling with post-partum depression.. However, no one in the family notices and Grace just thinks she’s a horrible mother. I wanted to shake her husband for being so clueless. And her mother Laura was horrid!The Last Anniversary has it all: Well-drawn characters, a well-plotted mystery and a good dose of humor to keep it from being too heavy I’m so looking forward to completing my mission of reading her entire backlist. And eagerly awaiting her next book!
    • 4/5
      4.25 stars“If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you might as well make it dance.” - George Bernard ShawWarning: Do not read this book in the vicinity of sleeping babies or people with a nervous disposition. Your frequent spontaneous peals of laughter may startle them. The Last Anniversary is not a new book, but it is presently on the New York Times Bestsellers. It was originally published in Australia in 2005. Apparently interest in it has been revived due to the huge international success of the author’s more recent books. Frankly, as much as I enjoyed her other novels, this is my favorite – so far. Sophie Honeywell is a 39-year-old Sydney, Australia resident who works in human resources. She is the only child of Hans and Gretel Honeywell, a couple with an insatiable sense of fun and bottomless love for life, each other and their daughter. Sophie is a lovely person inside and outside with a sparkling personality who inspires confidence in almost everyone she meets. Three years prior, she broke up a year-long relationship with Thomas Gordon, just seconds before he was going to whisk her away to Fiji in order to propose to her on one of the islands’ white beaches. She was puzzled to hear his voice on the phone, asking to meet for a drink after work. He would only say that someone had died and he really could not say anything further on the phone. At the hotel lounge, Thomas explained that Aunt Connie, the family matriarch, had died in her sleep the day prior. Among the very organized stack of papers she left was a letter addressed to Sophie. Aunt Connie and Sophie had only met briefly two or three times during Thomas time. Aunt Connie and the rest of Thomas’ family lived on Scribbly Gum Island, a suburb of Sydney, across the river, though Thomas himself rarely visited the place when Sophie knew him. The letter from Aunt Connie informs Sophie she is the new owner of her lovely home because she knew Sophie would love and appreciate it. She shares a special memory with Sophie from one of her visits to the island, a small moment that meant literally everything to Aunt Connie. Although Scribbly Gum Island is fictitious, scribbly gums are in fact a type of eucalyptus tree. Moriarty used the very real Parramatta River as the location for her tiny island of six homes. Aunt Connie and Aunt Rose’s grandfather had won the island in a bet with a very wealthy man in the early 20th century. During their childhood, there were two homes – one for grandfather and one for the girls and their parents. Like millions of other people around the world, the Doughty family had a tough time during the Great Depression. Then an incident occurred which was to turn around their bleak circumstances. Alice and Jack Munro had been renting grandfather’s house after he passed away and on one particular day they asked the Doughty girls, teenagers at the time, to stop by for tea. When the girls got to the house, a marble cake was cooling, the tea kettle was whistling, and the Munros were gone, save for their baby girl, nestled in her crib. The sisters took the child home with them, talked their father into letting them keep her. Thus The Munro Baby Mystery is born. Connie, the older of the sisters, had an entrepreneurial mind and a fascination with mysteries, especially the real-life mystery of the Mary Celeste. This was a boat that was found abandoned in the Atlantic, on its way from New York to Italy, all ten people who had been aboard had disappeared. No signs of struggle or violence. Connie draws an analogy between the Mary Celeste and the Munro Baby Mystery and the Munro baby, named Enigma by the Doughtys, became a regional celebrity. Her story becomes the family business, a virtual gold mine. Besides tours of the Munro Home, there are souvenirs, selling the story to the media, and an anniversary festival celebrating the date they found Enigma. By the time Sophie enters the picture, Enigma is grandmother to Thomas, his sister Veronika, and their cousin Grace. She has been a living mystery for 73 years. The emotional ramifications of Connie’s death will rock this rather dysfunctional family to its very core and make this festival marking the discovery of the Munro baby the last anniversary. It is a heck of a ride. The Last Anniversary is filled with Moriarty’s (does Sherlock Holmes pop into your mind?) trademark wit, and her profound insights into human behavior. She tackles some serious issues in this book – adultery, rape and postpartum depression. Grace is a very successful children’s book writer and illustrator who at age 33 has just given birth to 8-week-old baby Jake. She is repulsed by being a mother and by the baby himself. She is convinced that the child does not like her at all. She fears that the maternal dysfunction of her great-grandmother Munro, who abandoned her own baby is in her DNA. She sits and stares at a carton of milk on the table for two hours, unable to move. Because of Grace’s physical beauty and her own reserved personality, no one recognizes the signs and when Callum, her husband, shares with his own mother that Grace is just not herself, he is basically just shushed. Sometimes husbands don’t get enough respect. Only a writer of Moriarty’s caliber and remarkable insight into human behavior could produce novels that cover such hot-button subjects and manage to make the reader laugh, drop kick them in the heart, and yet keep turning the pages.
    • 4/5
      I've liked every book by author Liane Moriarty. Enjoyable characters and storyline about a family that lives on a small island, and the shenanigans they get up to.
    • 4/5
      Not as good as Big Little Lies, it dragged to much at times but the last 50 or so pages redeemed the book. An entertaining quick read, from a great author.
    • 3/5
      Not as good as her later books. This was written earlier in her writing career, and I think she developed into a better writer as she went along. You can definitely see signs of her talent for character development and great dialogue. The ending was kind of anti-climactic and fizzled out, but all-in-all a worthwhile read.
    • 4/5
      I really enjoyed this book. Several friends have recommended Liane Moriarty to me and this was the first novel of hers that I have picked up. I didn't go into this book with any real expectations.I loved the strong sense of Australia that this book had. I love the specificity of the types of cookies they ate - the places they visited and the birds and flowers in the landscape. Never having been to Australia - I really enjoy all these details and they add so much to the telling of the book.The story was unusual and progressed in a page turning fashion. It was one part mystery and one part relationship novel - it worked and I liked the varied plot lines of the different characters. This is a great summer read - a terrific book to throw into your beach bag!
    • 3/5
      Predictable at times but love the cast of characters and getting a glimpse into their flaws, aspirations, and every day lives.
    • 4/5
      I love everything Liane writes, there is always a little surprise at the end!
    • 3/5
      Oh dear me. The true story only begins at the end.
    • 2/5
      not very good, i had very high hopes (since i'm currently obsessed with liane moriarty) but this one just doesnt make the cut
    • 4/5
      I really enjoyed it but wasn't thrilled about the ending at all. Would really make it 3.5 stars.
    • 4/5
      This book was a rollercoaster from start to finish! Sometimes it's hard to follow, and it's definitely not an easy read. Nonetheless I really enjoyed it! I couldn't put it down. It made me think and I appreciate any book that sticks in your mind after you've read it!
    • 5/5
      The Last Anniversary was a delightful novel, full of twists and turns and suspense, told in a beautifully written, humorous manner. The characters were engaging, eccentric and lovable. Highly recommended by this grateful reader!
    • 5/5
      Hurrying to read more from this talented writer. This story was charming, intricate, and full of unexpected turns and characters who quickly became beloved, warts and all. Lovely!
    • 4/5
      Best for:Fans of Liane Moriarty, fans of mysteries that unfold in unexpected ways, and fans of books that go a little deeper than you might expect.In a nutshell:Alice and Jack Munro abandoned their baby girl - named Enigma - 70 years ago. She's now a grandmother, and one of the sisters who rescued her has died, leaving behind some unfinished business.Worth quoting:“If her back had ever hurt like this when she was twenty she would have been hysterical, demanding painkillers and cups of tea in bed, but she has found that nobody is especially surprised to hear you’re in pain when you’re in your eighties. You might find it astonishing, but nobody else does.”Why I chose it:I realized after finishing her latest book that I hadn’t read all of them, so I remedied that quickly.Review:I liked this one a lot. I have a vivid picture of the fictional island where most of the book takes place. I can picture the characters, and while I don’t think I relate directly to any of them, I appreciate how they are mostly well-thought-out and well built characters. They aren’t one note.The book starts after the death of Connie, who is in her 90s and was one of two sisters who discovered baby Enigma after her parents vanished from their home on the island. Connie has left her home to her great-nephew’s ex girlfriend Sophia, so that’s weird. Much of the book focuses on Sophia, but also on Grace, who is struggling deeply with post-partum depression. I was not expecting that but I think it’s handed interestingly (though I would defer to those who have actually experienced it). In broader terms the book looks at what family means, what secrets can do to and for a family, and how we often don’t really know our partners and family. I also like that we get the perspectives of older people in the book - people in their 70s and 90s. Rarely do we have those points of view, and as I’ve mentioned before, I appreciate exploring those experiences.I think What Alice Forgot is still my favorite of Moriarty’s books, but this one might be a close second.Keep it / Pass to a Friend / Donate it / Toss it:Donate it
    • 4/5
      To say the characters in this tale are unusual would be an understatement. Sophie has been given a rather large gift by a person she hardly knows. But this inheritance comes with some entanglements. Sophie finds herself enmeshed in an old family mystery involving a baby whose parents had vanished. There are many twists and turns in the tale, as well as some heartbreak and enlightenment, but I’d expect nothing less from a Liane Moriarty novel.
    • 3/5
      THE LAST ANNIVERSARY is written by Australian author Liane Moriarty.I like Ms. Moriarty’s writing style. Her characters are dissected and presented on a platter for better or worse. Plots are engaging with multiple layers.THE LAST ANNIVERSARY concerns a very dysfunctional family (past and present) who manufactured a mystery so as to cover up a tragedy and rise from poverty.I was slow to pick up all the nuances of character and plot until the ending of the book. It was puzzling, frustrating and a tad unrealistic, but I enjoyed the development and insights into each character and their evolution.My favorite of all Ms. Moriarty’s books has to be BIG LITTLE LIES, but each title has something to offer the reader and each title is interesting.