For One More Day

 

OVERVIEW:

"Every family is a ghost story..."

Mitch Albom mesmerized readers around the world with his number one New York Times bestsellers, The Five People You Meet in Heaven and Tuesdays with Morrie. Now he returns with a beautiful, haunting novel about the family we love and the chances we miss.

For One More Day is the story of a mother and a son, and a relationship that covers a lifetime and beyond. It explores the question: What would you do if you could spend one more day with a lost loved one?

As a child, Charley "Chick" Benetto was told by his father, "You can be a mama's boy or a daddy's boy, but you can't be both." So he chooses his father, only to see the man disappear when Charley is on the verge of adolescence.

Decades later, Charley is a broken man. His life has been crumbled by alcohol and regret. He loses his job. He leaves his family. He hits bottom after discovering his only daughter has shut him out of her wedding. And he decides to take his own life.

He makes a midnight ride to his small hometown, with plans to do himself in. But upon failing even to do that, he staggers back to his old house, only to make an astonishing discovery. His mother, who died eight years earlier, is still living there, and welcomes him home as if nothing ever happened..

What follows is the one "ordinary" day so many of us yearn for, a chance to make good with a lost parent, to explain the family secrets, and to seek forgiveness. Somewhere between this life and the next, Charley learns the astonishing things he never knew about his mother and her sacrifices. And he tries, with her tender guidance, to put the crumbled pieces of his life back together.

REVIEW:

 This story is about Charlie “Chick” Benetto. He was a famous baseball player before. He was injured during the peak of his career and everything just kind of went downhill from there. He is divorced and his relationship with his wife and daughter was far from perfect, to the point wherein her daughter got married and he never got invited. He just received a photograph from the wedding and that’s where he lost it... He decided to drive back to his childhood town and that’s where he wants to end his life. After a few attempts he is still alive but for a moment he lost consciousness and that’s where he “dreamed?” or “hallucinated?” that he is with his mother who passed away years ago. And he get to spend one more day with his mother..

 When I was reading this book, it made me think of myself when I was a teenager. I was a little rebel during my teenage years and I know I broke my mom’s heart a lot of times. Now that I am a mom myself I now understand how it is possible to love someone more than myself. Like what chick’s mom always showed him and his sister… Its unconditional love. Chick’s story tells us how he broke his mother’s heart because he is torn between pleasing his dad and he is afraid of disappointing him even though his dad left them and just disappeared from their lives, and randomly appearing like nothing happened.

 Well, the moral of the story is about not giving up on life even when you hit rock bottom. Because there are a lot chances in life and we just have to learn how to forgive ourselves and make amends with the people we hurt constantly. It’s about moving on and we just have to accept that life will give us lemons and that this life is short to live with hatred and regrets.     

RATING:

5.0