The 5 People You Meet in Heaven is a novel by the author of Tuesdays with Morrie , Mitch Albom. It recounts the life and death of a simple yet dignified old man, Eddie. After dying in a freak accident, Eddie finds himself in heaven where he encounters five people who have significantly affected his life, whether he realized at the time or not. Mitch Albom dedicates the book to his uncle Edward Beitchman. He says that he wants people like his uncle who felt unimportant here on earth to realize, finally, how much they mattered and how they were loved.
The Five People You Meet in Heaven was published in 2004 by Hyperion, and remained on the New York Times Best Seller list for 95 weeks.
Plot summary
The story is about a simple man named Eddie. He is the Head of Maintenance at Ruby Pier.Eddie is described as gruff and coarse in appearance. The story begins with Eddie's last day on Earth — his eighty-third birthday. As he goes about his everyday routine, a sudden scream near a tower drop ride alerts him to danger — one of the cars has come loose, suspended hundreds of feet in the air. As other workers rush to free the passengers of the ride, Eddie realizes that the cable that supports the car must have somehow come unraveled; he is right in this assumption, as weeks earlier, a young man accidentally lost his car keys in the ride, causing the cable to be husked like an ear of corn.
Eddie tries to WARN his maintenance assistants not to release the brakes of the ride, but his voice is lost in the crowd so no one can hear his shouts. When the brakes are freed, the car comes hurtling toward the boardwalk. Eddie notices a little girl frozen in fear beneath the car; he dives to save her, and manages to push her out of the way - saving her life - though he himself fails to move and is killed by the falling cart.
Eddie finds himself transported to Heaven, which strangely looks like the Ruby Pier of his childhood. While there, he encounters a strange face: the Blue Man , or Joseph Corvelzchik, a "freak" in Ruby Pier's old freak show. The Blue Man explains that Heaven is not the Eden — like atmosphere often imagined; rather, it is a personal journey. Five different individuals are "appointed" to each new person in Heaven, and all visit them to learn one lesson and, in turn, discover their meaning and purpose in life. The Blue Man begins by telling his own story. He attained his “freak” status by using silver nitrate as treatment for his nerves. At first, he was shunned by all — until he was discovered by a traveling circus. He found happiness in being the "best freak" in the shows, and reveals that Ruby Pier is his own, personalized Heaven.
Eddie is intrigued by the Blue Man's tale, but wonders how the two are connected; he vaguely remembers seeing him as a child, growing up along Ruby Pier. The Blue Man explains that Eddie and his friends inadvertently killed him while playing a baseball game in the street — the Blue Man swerved to avoid hitting the children, which resulted in a heart attack. Eddie apologizes profusely and prepares to "pay" for his "sin" — but the Blue Man laughs and explains that he has no need for regret. He then teaches Eddie his lesson — all people are connected in some way, be it a close friendship or a simple bond. With this lesson passed on, the Blue Man moves on, his skin becoming "perfect" as Eddie is transported to his next stage of Heaven.
Eddie is transported to a war-torn battlefield, full of explosions and bones. He discovers a set of dog tags that bear his name, and painfully recalls his own war days, in the Philippines during World War II. A voice suddenly calls out to him — it is the Captain , Eddie's commanding officer and Second Person. The two talk, and Eddie remembers their horrid experiences. He and his men were captured by Japanese soldiers and held prisoner for some time; eventually, the group escaped and, in an act of retaliation, destroys the village that their enemies had built.
While burning the various huts to the ground, Eddie spotted a shadow in one of the buildings. He began to scream for whoever was inside the hut to emerge, nearly losing his mind after months of starvation and isolation. He pushed away his fellow soldiers as he prepared to enter the flaming hut. A sudden blast of pain in his leg stopped him from entering — this bullet wound warped Eddie's leg completely. The resulting depression and post-traumatic stress that this wound caused halted his life for a good deal of time, and he reveals that he never truly recovered spiritually or emotionally from the war.
The Captain reveals the truth of that night — it was he that shot Eddie to save his life. An enraged Eddie attacks the Captain viciously, until the officer reveals that while Eddie laid in the back of a convoy, unconscious, he stepped forward to look for more soldiers. The Captain accidentally stepped on a land mine, which killed him instantly. Eddie apologizes for his selfishness, but the Captain turns this into his lesson: sacrifice. He explains that all people make sacrifices and choices, and it is only the most painful of these choices that allows others to live. Eddie forgives the Captain, who reveals that his Heaven truly resembles an untouched Paradise before he, too, moves on.
Eddie is then taken to an isolated diner amidst snow-covered purple mountains. He notices that many of the restaurant's patrons have been injured, and that the man sitting in a corner booth is his father. He begins to scream out "Dad!", but a voice stops him. It is the voice of an elderly woman, who introduces herself by explaining her life. She was a waitress in a diner similar to the one before the pair, and reveals that she married a wealthy man named Emile who, in an act of love, built an amusement park for her to capture her youth forever. She is Ruby , the namesake of Ruby Pier. She has come to regret the park's existence, though, as it caught fire one night, burning almost everything to the ground. Emile's fortune was gone, and Ruby nursed him back to health, all the while wishing that her park had never been built.
As Ruby tells her tale, Eddie remembers his agonizing relationship with his father. The man was often drunk, and often hit Eddie and his brother Joe after bad nights. Eddie's father also never told his son that he loved or cared for him; the only praise Eddie ever received was when he fixed something broken on Ruby Pier. After the war, Eddie's father confused his son's depression and stress with weakness, and tried to abuse him again; Eddie resisted, and the two stopped speaking.
Ruby forces Eddie to confront the night that his father died. Mickey Shea, a maintenance worker at the pier and an alcoholic, had come to Eddie's home, drunk. While there, he tried to molest Eddie's mother. When Eddie's father arrived, Mickey ran into the rain-soaked night, eventually stumbling into the waters surrounding the pier. Though furious, Eddie's father dives into the ocean and saves Mickey; the resulting pneumonia killed him. Ruby explains that she knows this because Emile shared a hospital room with his father.
Ruby finally imparts her lesson on Eddie: anger is a terrible feeling that results in nothing but pain for all parties. She explains that her diner in Heaven is a reminder of a simpler time, and a haven for all those injured at Ruby Pier. She also urges Eddie to forgive his father, explaining that he cannot move on until he does so. Eddie confronts the old man, and breaks down emotionally as he utters two words: "It's fixed." Ruby nods to Eddie as she disappears into the night.
After leaving Ruby, Eddie moves through various wedding receptions in his next stage of heaven. At one of the weddings, he encounters a woman handing out chocolates “for the bitter and the sweet.” It is his wife, Marguerite . Eddie loved her from the moment they met, before the war broke out, and never cared for anyone as much as his wife. The two planned to adopt a child, as Marguerite was unable to bear them herself.
Marguerite explained that it is never easy to deal with the loss of a loved one, and nearly impossible to cope with the premature death of a spouse. Although life is finite, love is eternal, she says. Marguerite explains to Eddie that even after a loved one dies, the feeling of love lives on. In the absence of a physical connection, in heaven he finds himself in a sea of white, empty and silent. He hears the sounds of screaming children — the same sounds that have haunted his dreams ever since the day he escaped captivity in the Philippines. Upon investigating the source of these screams, he finds children playing peacefully in a river. They are screams of joy, not of horror. Amongst the children, he finds a young Filipino girl, Tala . It turns out that she was the shadow he saw in the burning hut. He was responsible for her death.
After hysterically screaming and sobbing, Eddie collapses before the little girl, who shares with him his final lesson. Eddie explains to her that he was sad because he feels as if he didn’t do anything meaningful with his life. To this, she responds by sharing with him his purpose on earth. “Children. You keep them safe. You make good for me. Is where you were supposed to be. Eddie Main-ten-ance.” (p. 191).
Before Eddie exits his final stage in heaven, Tala tells him that he did, in fact, successfully push the young girl to safety from the plummeting ride. Eddie is confused at first, telling Tala that he felt his arms pulling her, not pushing. It turns out that these arms belonged to Tala, who was pulling him into heaven, keeping him safe.
Eddie is then
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