This 54 page short story is part of the Forward Collection which was curated by Blake Crouch which at time of posting is available on Kindle Unlimited. Our protagonist is nameless and wakes up in a dark room and has to relearn their past. It took me a while to figure out what was going on here and I thought this one was fine. I didn't enjoy it as much as I have the others in this collection.

A person wakes up in a dark room not knowing where they are or who they are. They only have a voice coming from another room (Dr. Kuhn/Anne) to try and get answers from. This was a really boring short story filled with tedious and repetitive conversations between two unrelatable (and in Anne’s case, annoying as well) characters. The story seemed to be biding its time without much happening just to lead up to the big reveal/twist at the end.

THE LAST CONVERSATION is my second read in the Forward series from Amazon, curated by Blake Crouch. I'm familiar with the works of Paul Tremblay and just read his latest collection GROWING THINGS a few months back. I felt that this story was a bit of a departure from his horror works and it was a change that I enjoyed. Being more of a mystery/science fiction tale, I found the end to be an unexpected surprise- and I love to be surprised!Thanks to Amazon/Audible for the free reads and the original...

No spoilers, but this one is easily the creepiest of the Forward collection. It's definitely a White Room mystery. :)Well worth the read and very possibly the best Paul Tremblay I've read.

The Last Conversation was the most "horror" of the Forward collection stories, which I guess is not surprising when you look at who the author is. It's an eerie tale that keeps us in the dark for most of the book, wondering what is going on, but knowing that something is definitely not right.The second person narration somehow makes it even creepier and more unsettling. I want to liken this story to a well-known movie, but that would give away a major spoiler. So let me just say: what goes on in...

What a bizarre and frightening novella! Who is this man obviously having come back from a coma and taught living again? Who is Anne Kuhn? What about this pandemic that killed so many people? What about cloning? Many crucial subjects are mentioned directly or indirectly in this fantastic and weird story. It was a bit confusing but the atmosphere was very dark. Sometimes it reminded me on Matheson and I am Legend, I also had to think about the novel Birdbox. The characters in Tremblay's novella se...

3 to 3.5 starsI have to be honest and say that approached this short story with trepidation. My open-mindedness to review this was tainted. I have read two Paul Tremblay novels and didn't like either of them - REALLY didn't like either of them (1 and 2 star reviews). Of all the Forward stories, this is the only one I really didn't want to listen to.So, today I decided to just rip off the band-aid and jump in feet first. At least it was only an hour and forty five minutes on audio so I knew if I

Rating: 3.5/5.0Genre:Science FictionIf you love Paul Tremblay's writing style you will like this book. He has his writing style all over it. It is creepy, mysterious and has a strange feeling to it! Even the narration itself where the main character is being addressed as "You" to the reader makes everything spooky. So when you wake up, you are blind and isolated alone in a room, completely unaware of everything else!Usually, this kind of narration style can be a hit or a miss. In this case, I wo...

The beginning had some potential but the ending didn't do it for me.

BEWARE OF SPOILERS! And, obviously, the DNA sequences drawn on the cover are not a spoiler for most of readers, as I just found out. For me, it was and I sort of felt I was aware from the start what would happen later on. Well, anyway, if you are scared of spoilers just stay away from this review :) And from the book cover :)This wasn't too innovative or striking or anything. So, this gal's a scientist and the guy's a part of a long chain of something. Striking? No. They have this plague and she...

I will read anything and everything by Paul Tremblay. He is one of those authors that aims for your secret, undisclosed fears--some of which you don't even know about into you're knee-deep into one of his novels and plain scared out of your mind by some fresh horror you wish didn't exist.This short story, THE LAST CONVERSATION, tapped a new fear for me. The narrative resembles an omniscient 2nd person POV, employing YOU to play the role of the main character.YOU wake up in a strange room feeling...

"Dear" Paul Tremblay,I've just finished THE LAST CONVERSATION. I loathe second-person narration...so chest-pokey, so accusatory...but this story made me leak tears and gasp for breath and I do not ever want to be that lonely and how did you do that in spite of thumping my nose for 60 pages?Five stars. Bastard.CheersRMDexpendablemudge.blogspot.com

Brilliant play on real versus replica and the authenticity of memory and identityTo forget is to lose something that was once yours, that was once of yourself.An eerie and well build up story, centered around the the experience of someone waking up in a dark room, without memories, only being talked to by a mysterious doctor through an intercom.The start point is more often seen (it made me think of More Than This, Slated, The Raw Shark Texts and a Haruki Murakami novel I don't quite remember th...

Creepy, chilling, unsettling and bleak....

The Last Conversation a Novella by Paul Tremblay is the second story I have read from the Blake Crouch created, The Forward Collection. The first story I read was written by the magnificent Amor Towles. This offering by Tremblay is equally as good – but alas, I can’t really write too much about this one as it’ll give the game away.What I can say is, the The Last Conversation is written in the second person. I don’t come across this technique too much, but I like it as we – the reader – are throw...

3.5 stars. Review first posted on Fantasy Literature:A person — whose name and gender are never specified, because that person is “you” — wakes up, alone in a room. You’re blind and in intense pain, and at first you remember nothing at all of your past. You only hear one person, Dr. Anne Kuhn, who instructs you through a speaker: testing you mentally, badgering you to exercise, and, little by little, giving you bits of information about your past life and about why you are where you are now. Gra...

“To forget is to lose something that was once yours, that was once of yourself. But how could one lose something as expansive as an ocean in a dusty corner of one’s mind? What if, instead, to forget is to open a door to a void; the memory is not retrievable because it is not there, was never there.” The loss of memory and identity is a terrifying concept. What makes you - *you*? Suddenly not having that you-ness and knowing that someone else has the keys to it, to your very self - but chooses

This is the spookiest, eeriest, most haunted, horrifying, chilling story of the Forward series. I know my husband is gonna get crazy when he realizes the increasing zeros at our electric bill because I will turn on the lights again as soon as he sleeps tonight. (Actually I plan to turn on entire lights of the house just in case not screaming after seeing something shapeless, spooky –like my sister in law who visits only for one week, stays in the guest room, don’t tell I called her shapeless, sh...

This might be my favorite work of Tremblay so far.

This story is part of the FORWARD collection and a great addition to the series. The first book I read from this author was THE CABIN AT THE END OF THE WORLD which was an intense horror novel.This short story is different but as deeply scary and creepy as the novel I mentioned. Imagine you wake up in a dark room, very dark. You can't see anything at all and you don't know if it's because the room is dark or if it's because you're blind. But worst of all is realizing you don't know who you are or...