Funnily, the opening line of my novel came quite easily but the last line took me ages to be happy with (and I still might swap the last two lines around). Does anyone else spend much longer on the last line than on any other line in the novel? Does anyone else, like me, often read the last line of a novel before buying the book?

My fave is Gatsby’s : so we beat on, like boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

Ceaselessly - now, surely that’s an excellent example of an adverb perfectly rendered?

I thought Atwood’s ‘Any questions?’ at the end of Handmaid’s was good too (though I never finished the book!)

Some writers get it wrong, IMHO. Monica Ali’s ‘This is England. You can do anything’ I thought was a bit wrong-headed.

Sam

Good thread, and I'm interested how much harder they are to remember than first lines - I'm going to have to head for my bookshelves.

Emma

Well, there is of course, 'It is a far, far better thing that I do...'

And for some reason the ending of Nancy Mitford's The Pursuit of Love has stuck with me:

'But I think she would have been happy with Fabrice,' I said. 'He was the great love of her life, you know.'
'Oh, dulling,' said my mother sadly. 'One always thinks that. Every, every time.'

<Added>

Oops -- I just realised there's something of a spoiler in the lines from The Pursuit of Love. Sorry.

But Mitford isn't really about the plot at all, so perhaps it doesn't matter...

One of the most memorable and emotive last paragraphs I've read is from David Mitchells number9dream. Absolutely breathtaking.

Geoff