Ottawa Book Award Finalist 2021! “The Last Goldfish by Anita Lahey is about an intense and joyful friendship between two girls that begins in Grade Nine and lasts through adolescent self-doubts, student adventures and heart-breaking tragedy. Exquisitely written and never mawkish, this memoir relies on vivid imagery, precise language and unflinching reflection. The story is a quiet miracle — both deeply personal, and also universal in its treatment of themes to which any reader can relate.” (Jury citation)

“…you wanna call your best friend between chapters.” Skylar Kay on The Last Goldfish for Freefall Magazine

The Last Goldfish makes the WBNA’s 2020 Great Group Reads Selections.

My interview for the Eden Mills Writers’ Festival’s “On Being Alive” reading list.

My interview with Ellen Chang-Richardson on Living with Dying for Ottawa International Writers’ Festival Radio.

The Winnipeg Free Press calls The Last Goldfish‘s tale of a close friendship a welcome contrast to life during a pandemic: ‘Bonds of friendship persist…”

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Twenty-five years ago and counting, Louisa, my true, essential, always-there-for-everything friend, died. We were 22.

When Anita Lahey opens her binder in grade nine French and gasps over an unsigned form, the girl with the burst of red hair in front of her whispers, Forge it! Thus begins an intense, joyful friendship, one of those powerful bonds forged in youth that shapes a person’s identity and changes the course of a life.

Anita and Louisa navigate the wilds of 1980s suburban adolescence against the backdrop of dramatic world events such as the fall of the Berlin Wall. They make carpe diem their manifesto and hatch ambitious plans. But when Louisa’s life takes a shocking turn, into hospital wards, medical tests, and treatments, a new possibility confronts them, one that alters, with devastating finality, the prospect of the future for them both.

Equal parts humorous and heartbreaking, The Last Goldfish is a poignant memoir of youth, friendship, and the impermanence of life.

Order from your local bookstore or purchase from the publisher below.