The Five People You Meet in Heaven | 
 enlarge | Author: Mitch Albom
Publisher: Hyperion
Category: Book
List Price: $19.95
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Rating:  1610 reviews
Sales Rank: 1260
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1
Pages: 198
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.6
Dimensions (in): 7.4 x 5.1 x 0.9
ISBN: 0786868716
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.6
EAN: 9780786868711
Publication Date: September 2003
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Amazon.com Review
Part melodrama and part parable, Mitch Albom's The Five People You Meet in Heaven weaves together three stories, all told about the same man: 83-year-old Eddie, the head maintenance person at Ruby Point Amusement Park. As the novel opens, readers are told that Eddie, unsuspecting, is only minutes away from death as he goes about his typical business at the park. Albom then traces Eddie's world through his tragic final moments, his funeral, and the ensuing days as friends clean out his apartment and adjust to life without him. In alternating sections, Albom flashes back to Eddie's birthdays, telling his life story as a kind of progress report over candles and cake each year. And in the third and last thread of the novel, Albom follows Eddie into heaven where the maintenance man sequentially encounters five pivotal figures from his life (a la A Christmas Carol). Each person has been waiting for him in heaven, and, as Albom reveals, each life (and death) was woven into Eddie's own in ways he never suspected. Each soul has a story to tell, a secret to reveal, and a lesson to share. Through them Eddie understands the meaning of his own life even as his arrival brings closure to theirs. Albom takes a big risk with the novel; such a story can easily veer into the saccharine and preachy, and this one does in moments. But, for the most part, Albom's telling remains poignant and is occasionally profound. Even with its flaws, The Five People You Meet in Heaven is a small, pure, and simple book that will find good company on a shelf next to It's A Wonderful Life. --Patrick O'Kelley
Product Description
Plot Eddie is a wounded war veteran, an old man who has lived, in his mind, an uninspired life. His job is fixing rides at a seaside amusement park. On his 83rd birthday, a tragic accident kills him, as he tries to save a little girl from a falling cart. He awakes in the afterlife, where he learns that heaven is not a destination. It's a place where your life is explained to you by five people, some of whom you knew, others who may have been strangers. One by one, from childhood to soldier to old age, Eddie's five people revisit their connections to him on earth, illuminating the mysteries of his "meaningless" life, and revealing the haunting secret behind the eternal question: "Why was I here?" Personal Details Collection Status In Collection Index 10 Read It Yes Links Amazon US Product Details LoC Classification PS3601.L335F59 2003 Dewey 813/.6
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| Customer Reviews: Read 1605 more reviews...
 I couldn't put this book down. April 7, 2004
Kenneth Yeh (Westminster, CO)
147 out of 160 found this review helpful
I just got this book today when someone recommended it to me and when I started reading it I couldn't put it down. I skipped dinner and didn't do my homework but it was just that good. It leaves you wondering if you ever made a difference in someone's life here on earth. Then it makes you wonder who the five people you will meet in heaven are. This book was truly inspirational. It makes you want to go out into the world and try and make as big as impact on people's lives. I recommend anyone to read this book whether you believe in heaven or not. It's an absolutely amazing book.
A true and compelling study of the meaning of life November 15, 2003
MomofThree (McKinney, TX United States)
568 out of 649 found this review helpful
Without going into the set-up of the story (which you can find in other reviews), I'll simply say this amazing little book is on my Christmas shopping list for those that are the dearest to my heart. This is a book I want to share with everyone! Not to scare anyone away from it -- by the end of this story, I was a sobbing mess! The first four of Eddie's people give little pieces of the puzzle, profound little tidbits to help him understand more about the events in his life. But his "fifth person" reveals Eddie's true purpose in life, a life that Eddie felt was a "nothing existence" on Earth. He learns from his fifth person that his life was an incredibly important piece of the tapestry of life's experience here -- one that meant more to people than he could ever have dreamed. A truly inspiring piece of American literature that EVERYONE should read!!
Another life-defining book from Mitch Albom October 20, 2003
Andy Tan (Baltimore)
50 out of 56 found this review helpful
To tell the truth, after reading Tuesdays with Morrie from Mitch Albom, I did have high expectations for this follow-up.
And I must say that my expectations were more than surpassed by another winner from him.
The interweaving of Eddie "Maintenance"'s various aspects of life from his childhood, teenage years, courtship, military service, marriage, middle age to old age and finally the beginning of his journey through heaven was beautifully and intricately spun in this short tale.
The poetic descriptions of the various "steps" in heaven that Eddie traversed through in search for inner peace before his final resting destination and the 5 lessons he had to learnt brought to mind the eternal existentialistic questions of why we are here and what our life purpose is, in a quiet and non-intrusive manner. So much so that we can be prompted to examine our own lives more sympathetically.
The message I got from Mitch Albom at the end was that Eddie could have been anyone of us and that we do not need to wait for our turn to meet our five people in heaven to recognise that whatever we are doing now has meaning and has purpose in wonderful and beautiful ways and that we should never allow ourselves to belittle our lives.
Not quite the tearjerker as Tuesdays but Five People has certainly touched my heart and a few others in more ways than one. I hope that you will allow this beautiful book to touch yours too.
Kudos to Mitch Albom and a big thank you to his uncle Eddie for being the source of inspiration for this would-be classic.
God bless
The Five People You Meet In Heaven December 2, 2003
25 out of 27 found this review helpful
This hearty little 200-page book provokes the everlasting question, "What happens when you die?" to rise to familiarity among our thoughts once again. I have wondered where Mr. Albom was inspired to write a story such as this; with such intensity as was shown.
The story tells of an old man, named Eddie, who dies trying to save a little girl from a falling ferris-wheel cart at a carnival. Eddie goes to heaven, and with the help of five seemingly non-impacting people, he relives his life, point by life-altering point and he begins to understand why he lived and what his purpose on earth was.
With Mr. Albom's unique flashback technique of writing, this story comes alive within the imagination of it's readers.
A wonderful and deeply intense book and I recommend it to individuals who have read and loved Mr. Albom's previous book, Tuesday's With Morrie.
Many will learn to love and appreciate this book and I hope that reading this review will persuade YOU to read it as well.Thank You ... and Congratulations, Mr. Albom for writing a wonderful book.
A delightful, moving fable. October 5, 2003
Michael A. (Denver, CO USA)
29 out of 32 found this review helpful
Mitch Albom as taken the experiences of a man's seemingly useless life, and unwrapped a story that is a gift to each of us.
His use of the language, and ability to evoke real emotions from his character AND his reader at the same time is truly amazing.
I found this to be a fairly quick read, and read it in one 4 hour sitting. The Author tugs at hearstrings, provokes thought and smiles as the main character sometimes fumbles his way through a timeless heaven, discovering that in the end, his life had more meaning than he could ever imagine.Mitch Albom is going to solidify his status as a national treasure with this book.
Give this book to everyone on your Christmas list!
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