This selection of common people as protagonists is rather rare for Swift. The text is a juxt apposition of their memories about the same dead person, it is a collage of various voices talking about betrayal and failure. It is a model of retrospective prose. When writing a novel, it is hard to pick the right voice - the main narrator but Swift is a master of this art. Voices and narrators that he chooses help him create a moment here and now in its whole complexity. Another feature of this novel that is extremely striking is the mimetic subduing of the sapful and spicy language of the common people:

“ As if there was something wrong about used cars and something bleeding holy about meat “
/Last Orders p. 24/

“ Pips on man’s shoulders don’t mean a tuppenny toss. “
/Last Orders p. 28/

“ Jack’s dying and I’ve got a cockstand. “
/Last Orders p. 34/

The novel's title refers to the "Last Orders " or last wish of Jack Dodds, a London butcher, who wants "his ashes to be chucked off the end of Margate pier" - in the words of Ray Johnson, one of the narrators. This is a rather melancholic, or even morbid starting-point for story telling. The title also refers to the location from which the journey to Margate starts: to The Coach and Horses, a local pub in Bermondsey, south London, where Jack's friends order their "last" drink before embarking on their trip. The story begins in an East London pub. And Jack Dodds, dead and alive, is present from the start right up to the final moment when his ashes are carried away by the wind at the end of Margate Pier. It is Jack's boxed ashes, which bring his family and friends together in their favourite Bermondsey pub; and it is this heavy box and its contents that prompt their reminiscences on the car ride to the South Coast town of Margate. Shared memories overlap as the trip to Margate progresses, and in the forced intimacy of the car, old grudges re-surface and cause unexpected diversions. But finally, Jack's 'last orders' for the disposal of his ashes are carried out - more or less as he directed.
The participants in the journey to Margate are three close friends of Jack, all in their late sixties: Ray Johnson, an insurance clerk and gambler, Vic Tucker, the undertaker, whose "family business" is situated next to Jack's butcher shop, and Lenny Tate, the ex-boxer. Their driver is Vince Dodds, the motor-dealer and adopted son of Jack and Amy, who picks up the other three in a showy "royal blue Merc".