"This is How We Make a Life"

Welcome home Chris P and thank you SO much for hosting our gathering!  It is always gratifying to share good food in the company of good friends.

This month our discussion was about "As Bright As Heaven" by Susan Meissner.  The author researched the Spanish flu pandemic and presented her information via story based in Philadelphia, a city which had thousands of flu victims.  The Spanish flu killed more people worldwide than had died in WWI.  An interesting twist was that this story was set in a mortuary, a location greatly affected by the deaths as bodies were stacking up in many rooms and people would leave bodies on the porch as there was nowhere else to take them.  I would have liked it if Sandy were still in our group as her father was a mortician and she would have interesting insights to share with us.

Although the information about the pandemic was staggering, many felt the author didn't get to the core of each character.  They commented that in other books written in this format of each characters' voice, you knew who "spoke" in each chapter without their name being identified.  In this novel, you had to pay attention to the name on each chapter to know who was speaking.  Also, the ending seemed somewhat unbelievable as each characters' outcome was wrapped up with too many neat bows. 

The book did present several good points to ponder:
Time changes everything - sometimes fast and sometimes slow.
Death is not a cruel phantom but more like a quiet friend.
The gap between heaven and earth may seem vast but in reality is very small.

There were also several good quotes:
"It's as if the body is a candle and the soul its flame.  When the flame is snuffed out, all that is left to prove that there had been a flame is the candle."
"Different doesn't have to mean things can't be good again..."
"...our eyes don't change much from when we were young.  Perhaps it's just how we see things that change."

In the Author's Acknowledgements the author asks "How does this knowledge that we are mortal affect our choices?"  "Each of our stories will end, in time, but meanwhile, we will fill the pages of our existence with all the love we can, for as long as we can.  This is how we make a life."