In this first novel from Tuesdays with Morrie
and The Five People You Meet in Heaven
author Albom, grief-stricken Charles "Chick" Benetto goes into an alcoholic tailspin when his always-attentive mother, Pauline, dies. Framed as an "as told to" story, Chick quickly narrates her funeral; his drink-fueled loss of savings, job ("sales") and family; and his descent into loneliness and isolation. After a suicide attempt, Chick encounters Pauline's ghost. Together, the two revisit Pauline's travails raising her children alone after his father abandons them: she braves the town's disapproval of her divorce and works at a beauty parlor, taking an extra job to put money aside for the children's education. Pauline cringes at the heartache Chick inflicted as a demanding child, obnoxious teen and brusque, oblivious adult chasing the will-o'-the-wisp of a baseball career. Through their story, Albom foregrounds family sanctity, maternal self-sacrifice and the destructive power of personal ambition and male self-involvement. He wields pathos as if it were a Louisville Slugger—shoveling dirt into Pauline's grave, Chick hears her spirit cry out, " 'Oh, Charley. How could you?' "—but Albom often strikes a nerve on his way to the heart. (Sept. 26)
Details
Reviewed on: 08/28/2006
Genre: Fiction
Compact Disc - 978-1-4013-8724-2
Compact Disc - 978-1-4789-6237-3
Hardcover - 197 pages - 978-0-316-73093-8
Hardcover - 1 pages - 978-1-4055-0127-9
Other - 208 pages - 978-1-4013-8886-7
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Prebound-Glued - 197 pages - 978-1-60686-158-5
