The Five People You Meet in Heaven

This book started out very promising. Creative premise. Unfortunatly the writer couldn't pick up the pace enough to keep the story from dragging. This is probably better-suited to a short-story format. Not a bad book all in all, but I don't feel it delivered what it promised.

A beautifully written short novel about what heaven might be like for a elderly man named Eddie. A novel rich in emotions this book has became a favorite.

Thought-provoking!

I only found this book to be so-so. Based on the high reviews, I really expected to have a sort of mind-blowing experience with the content of this book. The plot appeared interesting, and I had hoped this would be one of those books that stayed with me for a while.

Unfortunately, this book was not so profound for me, and I never made that connection with the characters. I appreciate the attempt, but this book was just not for me.

A quick and heartwarming read, perhaps bigged up a little too much so my expectations were pretty high. It didn't disappoint Too much however but this book probably doesn't need me to recommend it any further.

super Book!

Good book to read

Great book!

Sad but sweet. When you reach the end you feel much better about your own life.

I approached this title with some caution, not being a great fan of moralistic writing. However, the ease of the narrative style soon won me over, and I discovered this as both an intelligent and an emotionally intelligent work. In truth, I found it more accessible than, say, a lot of Paulo Coelho, which I can admire from the point of view of the craft of writing, but which puts up more barriers for me in its apparent intent. Maybe Albom's motivation here is still to be motivational, but at the same time, the novel works well on a structural level, and the concept of heaven can relatively easily be taken as an illuminating literary device, without necessarily heading off into the uneasy terrain of evangelism. It's not that the book is without 'teaching', but the teaching is also used as a literary device, which possibly makes the work easier on a secular eye. This is fiction with sentiment, but without being overly sentimental, and for me it is stronger for walking that tight-rope.

Charming but lightweight, with a simplistic, Christian left philosophy. The characters Albom creates are nicely drawn out, but overall, it leaves you feeling like you had dessert without any lunch, and leaves you feeling slightly sticky from all the heartwarming syrup.

Brilliantly written by one of my favorite authors. Enjoyable and a quick read. but have a tissue present. I cried for most of the last wonderfully moving half of the book. Worth the read. 9/10

This is the first of Mitch Albom's books I read and I could not put it down , I started reading one afternoon and stayed there till I finished . It affected me in so many ways . I never used to rave about books but this is the first book I remember holding up to people saying it will change the way you think. I know nutcase , but the people who did read it all came back to me and said yes they understood , the impact we have on others lives without realising it is just mindblowing......... makes you think........ read it it's a must

I adore Mitch Albom novels. I cheered when this book was made into a movie.

The Five People gives a glimpse into eternity, and a chance to understand the past. The main character meets with five people who shaped his life, and the journey is beautiful. It is a quick read, but has a lot of substance.

In Mitch Albom's first attempt at fiction, the story weaves its way around Eddie, an 83 year old man that the narrator says is about to die at the beginning of the novel. After dying, Eddie views his funeral and reaction from his friends, and relives parts of his past as five different people take him through the afterlife after his death. Eddie's five guides reveal how he affected their lives in ways he didn't even realize.Albom used a more experimental method of storytelling in this novel. It was a bit of a different take from a man who was a sports writer and then wrote a massive best-selling memoir. His diverse background lends himself to approaching a novel in a way a traditional novelist probably would not try. There was some good and some bad. The storytelling was light-hearted but a bit sappy at times. There was nothing hard hitting in this story, either from a plot standpoint or an emotional viewpoint. That makes this story an interesting read, but nothing spectacular.Carl Alves - author of Blood Street

Excellent book!! My daughter recommended this book after reading it at school. What happens immediately after a person dies? Through his the story of Eddie the amusement park maintenance man, Mitch Albom describes heaven as a place where you learn the meaning of your life through five people you interacted with on Earth. This is a very touching story and a quick read.

I especially loved this book. It only took a few days to read, so it's definitely worth it if you have the time. It wasn't preachy, as I thought it could have been. But rather, it's a spiritual way of looking at life's lessons in the form of a narrative. The five people you meet in heaven are those lessons that people we meet in our lives teach us. Each person has their own individual story, yet this story is intricately interwoven with one another. So here are the five lessons that I took from the story:

1. The Butterfly Effect. Our actions have an effect on others, no matter how big or trivial those actions may be. Your spontaneous decision to check your watch may very well have killed someone due to the glare from the sun hitting a passing driver's eye. But of course, our actions could also have fortuitous effects on others. We are all connected...we just don't know it yet.

2. Those that we love make sacrifices for us, and the opposite is true, too. As we grow up, we learn to understand our parents for the sacrifices they made. We learn about our friends' sacrifices. Our loved ones.

3. We must learn to not only forgive others, but to forgive ourselves as well. Carrying around emotional pain hurts. Letting go allows us to elevate our happiness in life.

4. Life has to end. Love doesn't.

5. We should treasure what we have in life. Live life with no regrets. No matter how crappy we might think of our current predicament, we are experiencing it for a reason. It helps us grow. And since we all grow differently, we must suffer and enjoy different experiences as well.

Five people. Five lessons.

Touching and hopeful. Makes me appreciate life a little bit more.

READ IN ENGLISH

When I was 13 I watched the movie-adaptation with my parents and was heavenly shocked by the story. I had always heard that heaven was a wonderful place, and this version seemed to be really confrontational. Showing you everything you lost and everyone's trouble you caused.

But it made me want to read the book as well. And though I already knew the story I really liked the book. The way it was written was just fitted the story and the context. I was a little bit older when I read the book, and everything seemed to be more in place now. It's a wonderful book I would love to recommend to everyone!

I really enjoyed that this book shows how people effect one another and how they effect where people end up. I also liked how Eddie got to realize the meaning of his life and the good his life did for others, even when he didn't realize he was helping others. I don't believe in fate or destiny, but it is a nice thought that things happen to put us in a place where we are able to help others. I think this book has the subtle message that we can do this while alive too - to be aware of how we are affecting people (positively and negatively). A good read.

The story is an intriguing one. Eddie, a park maintenance man in his 80s, dies while attemtping to rescue a small girl from a nasty fairground accident. The book opens by mentioning that he's about to die, then gives a countdown of his last hour. So it's no shock when it happens. The focus of the book is what happens after he dies - where, as the title explains, he meets five specific people. These aren't necessarily five people he would have expected to meet, indeed he barely knows one of them and had never met another. However each of them had some involvement in his life, and is there to teach him something he needs to learn before he can have a peaceful eternity.

It might sound trite, but I didn't find it that way at all. It could have been confusing - the book is a complex tapestry with snapshots of Eddie's life interspersed with his heavenly meetings. But it's very cleverly written, building up a vivid picture of this thoroughly likeable old man.

All in all, a highly recommended 'different' type of book.

An imaginative book with a totally different point of view, the kind of story that makes people think. Enjoyable and very human. The book is short and easy to read.

The five people you meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom - Very good, thought provoking

Normally I would let a book like this sink in before committing my thoughts, but as I want to release this in a few hours time, I shall try straightaway.

A thought provoking book and while it doesn't appear on the majority of 'lists' it was recently doing the rounds in one of the memes. Quite rightly so!

Eddie dies in an accident on his 83rd birthday. He's turned into a sad, bitter, lonely old man - there are not many left to mourn his passing. But this isn't about those left behind, it is about Eddie and his afterlife.

When you reach Heaven, you are greeted, in turn, by five people. Each has been a part, however briefly, of your life and will teach you something about your life and decisions that you hadn't realised during your lifetime.

For Eddie, this is a painful and yet uplifting experience. As he learns each lesson and passes to the next person until he finally realises what he has, or hasn't, achieved in his life and moves on to his own personal heaven and waits to be one of the five for someone whose life he has touched.

Some interesting lessons on judging people and events and understanding the value of the experiences of life.

Really glad I read this.

Eddie dies in an unfortunate accident and meets 5 people who either had a major impact on his life or he impacted their life. They teach him five unchangeable truths. A realization that we are always affecting those around us, for good or for bad and often times we don't even know it. Our lives are all a tangled web, intertwined and unbreakable for generations prior and generations to come. I loved it! Very thought provoking!

well written, amazing ideas

This was much better than I expected, and I wasn't expecting much. Parts of it were definitely cheesy, but the idea of seeing how your life intersected and affected others is definitely a compelling one, and the scenes in the diner and at the weddings are interesting.

From the author of Tuesdays with Morrie. Another personal story woven through an a people story with lives impacted. ok.

An 83 year-old man dies trying to save a little girl at the amusement park where he worked as a maintenance man. After he dies, he meets five people in heaven who show him his life had meaning.

It's a bit maudlin in places, but a very touching story. I kept thinking of who MY five people would be, and/or for which people I would be one of their five. But as Eddie's story unfolded, I kep revising who might be waiting for me to help me explain my life. Of course, it has to be someone who dies before I do. It has to be someone with a lesson to teach. It makes me want to keep my eyes and ears open for lessoins as I go through life.

Inspirational

Although at times this book can be a bit dry and boring, because the reader knows what the main character will be facing, it entices you to continue on to see how he has helped others in his life. By seeing just how much the main character has helped others during his lifetime, the reader begins to realize everyone has an impact on others and changes others lives. It is a great book to make you realize this and start seeing how you can consciously effect others lives in a positive way.