The Five People You Meet in Heaven (SPOILER)

First of all, this has some stuff that is essential to the plot, so if you plan to read The Five People You Meet in Heaven in the future, I would advise against reading this particular blog. You’ll regret it, it’ll ruin the story. But anyhow, this weekend, I was driving back from Georgia, so I had plenty of time to finish The Five People You Meet in Heaven. Overall, I really liked the book, but either I just wasn’t as focused on the second half, or it wasn’t as interesting. The whole last part was somewhat a blur to me, and I didn’t really feel as though the ending was wrapped up. I will almost definitely go back and read it again though, because I think it will get better with more reads.
Going back to where I left of with my last post, after the Blue Man moves on to wherever people go after heaven, Eddie meets The Captain. The Captain was Eddie’s mentor during his time at war, and he had a big impact on Eddie’s life. There is a flashback to the time when Eddie and four other soldiers, including the Captain were held captives by an enemy army. They were forced to work in a coal mine under very poor conditions, and one of the men died. This had a huge impact on Eddie, and it was the catalyst in his and the Captain’s plans to escape. Finally one day, they escaped and set fire to the mine, but just as they were about to leave, Eddie thought he saw a little person in the mine and went back to save it, putting himself in grave danger. Now, the Captain reveals to Eddie that he was the one who shot Eddie in the leg, because he knew that if he didn’t Eddie would run into the fire and die. The Captain’s story teaches Eddie about sacrifice, and how it was better for him to be sent home from the war with an injured leg than to have died in that fire.
The third person Eddie meets is a woman named Ruby, who was actually the person that Ruby’s Pier, the place Eddie had worked most of his life, was named after. Although they had never met, Ruby explains to Eddie that when her husband Emile was dying in the hospital, he had shared a room with Eddie’s father, and learned about their family through him. Ruby talks to Eddie about how he needs to forgive his father for the things he did in his life, and explains to him the reasoning for his father’s actions.
The fourth person Eddie meets is his (ex)wife Marguerite. I think that for Eddie this was the ‘best part’ about heaven, because when people talked about Eddie, the first thing they thought of was how much he loved his wife. His visit with Marguerite is short, but it is clear that she was sent as one of his five people to show Eddie the meaning of love, and how much it can affect a person.
The fifth person that Eddie encounters in heaven is a little girl, who he doesn’t think he has ever met before. I should probably have mentioned in my first post that when Eddie died saving the little girl, as he slipped away into heaven he felt a little girls hands in his, guiding him. Obviously, I didn’t realize how crucial this was to the plot or I would have mentioned it. So anyway, a young oriental girl approaches Eddie and relates to him the story of how their lives are linked to each other. It turns out that the little girl, (who I thought was going to be the girl he saved at Ruby Pier) was actually the girl he thought he saw in the coal mine when it was on fire, and she was the one who had brought him to heaven. This was a very good twist at the end, because I hate really predictable books. Minus the last few pages, I enjoyed the book and I plan to read Tuesdays With Morrie in the near future, because I really like Albom’s style and characterization in particular.