The Five People You Meet in Heaven & For One More Day

The Five People You Meet in Heaven, Mitch Albom, 2003, Hyperion. Genre: Inspirational. 196 pages. Finished 3/19/2010.

For One More Day, Mitch Albom, 2006, Hyperion. Genre: Inspirational. 197 pages. Finished 3/20/2010.

LesOpinion: The snark is back.

After having been spoon-fed pure pablum for the past two days I am here to tell you, gentle reader, that Mitch Albom is a one-trick pony the likes of which I cannot stomach. Now, don't get me wrong, one-trick ponies aren't always a bad thing: I can sit through a Law & Order marathon on a rainy day and be perfectly content. And Mitch Albom is a writer with what appears, at first glance, to be a modicum of talent (he spins a good story, captures emotion well, and has a decent vocabulary). But he takes that crumb of talent and squanders it writing bullshit books about "heaven," dishing up lines like "When someone is in your heart, they're never truly gone" and "It's such a shame to waste time. We always think we have so much of it" and "..when you look at your mother, you are looking at the purest love you will ever know." Pardon me while I go over here and puke. My only reprieve is that I was spared Tuesdays with Morrie because the Field Memorial doesn't have it.

As if bad writing isn't enough: The author bio on the dust jacket reads "Albom serves on numerous charitable boards and has founded three charities." Now, as the director of a humane society, I'm all for affluent and influential people serving the greater good by serving on boards or founding charities. I'm also all for those people using whatever influence they have to promote the charity. But you'll notice that Albom doesn't promote the actual charities (it could have said, after all, "Albom serves on several charitable boards, including those promoting Alzheimer's research" or whatever). By stating that he "serves on numerous (numerous!) charitable boards" and as the founder of three (count 'em, three!) charities, Albom isn't doing anything to promote anyone but himself. He may as well have written "Albom is a far superior human being to the rest of us." I submit the following for the next bullshit book bio : "Mitch Albom is a smug motherfucker."