Five Persons you Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom

This is the 3rd Mitch Albom book that I have read. I will try to write on the 1st books, For One More Day, when I get the chance. After reading Tuesdays with Morrie, I began to wonder the rational behind the popularity of the books from this author as his storyline is always surrounding death. Why are people so fascinated with death? For me, I think his popularity is due to his way of writing and the language he used which makes his books easy reads.

In this book, an amusement park maintenance head died while saving a small girl when an accident happened. He then met 5 persons which has some effect on his life. In this world, people who died will meet 5 persons who will each tell a story in which the dead person is to learn something out of them.

The 1st person was a man who performed in the amusement park when Eddie(the dead person) was a kid. This man tells Eddie how Eddie caused his death, though Eddie did not know it. He showed Eddie how an action from Eddie caused other actions, which in turn caused his death.

The 2nd person is his army captain. They were in a war and were taken as prisoners of war. After 6 months of captivity, they managed to escape but before they do, Eddie was hesitating and this is causing the whole crew to be killed. The captain then told Eddie that it was him who shot his leg, so as to save the whole crew. The captain also subsequently died saving his whole crew.. His lesson for Eddie was that there is always a cause for every action.

The 3rd person is his wife, who died of cancer at an age of 49. His wife was always supporting him, when when he was in the war, married him when he came back. She motivated and encouraged him.

The 4th person was Ruby, the founder of the amusement park. Though Eddie has never met Ruby, she described how her husband built the amusement park for her, how they lost the amusement park and how they died poor. She also showed Eddie on why Eddie's father died. Everyone thought Eddie's father died due to his drunkenness. The truth was his father was trying to save his friend who fell into the raging sea. He developed puenmia and died. Eddie then regretted not communicating with his father.

The last person is the girl. The girl is at the village when Eddie, as a soldier, thought he saw her. This girl died as Eddie did not save her. The girl then showed to Eddie that he did however save the girl in the amusement park at the expense of his own life.

The story ended with that. From this story, I wonder who will be my 5 persons when I die and what would they be telling me.

Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom

I realised that I have not been written any blogs for quite sometime, in fact , it was about 7 months back since I have logged any of my reading tots on this blog. I have since read quite a few books, though not as many as I wanted. I have also purchased more than 30 books, which I hope I will finish reading in the near future and share with everyone in this blog.

Tuesdays with Morrie is a book which I have heard much about. Since I read my first Mitch Albom book - For One More Day, I have wanted to read his other books. And when I asked around on Mitch Albom's books, I was surprised that his books are very popular and Tuesdays with Morrie is considered by most one of the great books of our time. I think the best words to describe this book is "mind-provoking". There are many Tuesdays which Mitch words sank into my mind with much after effects.

After reading this book, around Feb 09, I have had numerous tales and thoughts that I would want to blog down. I decided to go more in depth into each of the provoking phrases with my own experiences or/and theories. I will try to write as many blogs as i can in my personal tots blog.

This book begins with how the author gets his reunion with his college professor after 16 years. It was under unfortunate circumstances that it was due to his professor's pending death that the author "remembered" his professor. After their first meeting, he was invited to his professor's house for chats on every Tuesday. Morrie's thinking and his way of life comes alive for all to see during these short chats.

Morrie is also very humorous. One of them is the way he says that the ultimate dependency is for others to have to wipe your ass. One of the phrases Morrie said which is very infixed in my mind is "once you learn how to die, you learn how to live". I think this is so very true. In life, though there are many situations which you have no control over, your life's direction is primarily determined and shaped by you and only you. How you choose to die and how people remembers you by when you die is also in your hands. Whether you want your friends to think you as a miser or a generous friend. Whether you go way out to help a friend or you are passive in relationships. Whether you are a loud or soft person. All these are up to you.

In all, I feel that this is one of the best books that I have read. The best part is of course its mind provoking phrases. As usual, the books which have been good reads to me must be easy to read. The language and the style of this author has been great. Just a couple weeks ago, my niece, aged 11, asked me to buy this book for her. I was rather surprised as I felt that though this book is an easy read, it should be read by people who are older and who can understand death better.