A review by haveloved
At Last by Edward St Aubyn

4.0

For a while, as I read and listened to this, I wasn't totally certain how I felt about it. The first three books of the quintet, taken together, were a really powerful experience, but I felt the fourth and most of this fifth book were too meandering for me. I simply wasn't as interested in the struggles surrounding Patrick's relationship with Eleanor as I was in his overcoming the trauma inflicted on him by David. There's so many side characters in this one I was starting to get tired of them distracting from Patrick and the people more immediately connected to him. But as much as I felt this book--which, like Bad News and Some Hope, is focused on the events of a single day--wandered too much and didn't entirely have my interest, I still found myself in tears at the final scene.

Spoiler

Patrick's moment of clarity and eventual peace with his understanding of his abusive parents was very moving, and rewarding as the sum total of the five books.

The brilliance of those few paragraphs made me tick up my rating of the book as a whole. The last two books of the five were not, for me, as fascinating and enthralling as the previous three, but taken together, the five novels will probably remain for quite a while one of the most complete and rewarding reading experiences I'm likely to have.