A book review on for one more day by Mitch Albom

An excerpt taken from the front inside cover:

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

Charley lives an ordinary life as a baseball playing boy, until his father disappears when he's eleven. In a time when divorce was uncommon, he spends the rest of his childhood embarrassed over his broken family and resenting his mother for it.

As an adult Charley does a short stint in professional baseball, but after an injury forces him out, he becomes an alcoholic and never recoups his zest for life. Until finally, he sees no meaning in life at all, and that's really where the story begins.

I'll admit I thought longer & harder before buying this book, about whether I actually wanted to read on this subject matter. With mourning the loss of my son, Montie, I was concerned the book would dredge up sad feelings, but it didn't really. 

As Charley is in the throes of grieving all his life wasn't, he heads back to the house in which he grew up and miraculously finds his mother there... who passed away years before.

The book takes us back and forth in time, sometimes sharing poignant moments when his mom stuck up for him in childhood or when he didn't stick up for his mom, and then back to the present as Charley follows his mother through what appears to be a routine day.

I do love Albom's style of writing. He expresses emotions and attitudes so clearly without being unnecessarily wordy. I mean, I like wordy, too, now and then, but sometimes some straight-forward writing is a breath of fresh air. 

I love that Albom gives us something to mull over in "what would I do with that" situations.

In the end, I've come to decide I wouldn't want to spend "one more day" with Montie the way this book outlines. To me that would be emotional torture. Even in the deliriously happy moments of just seeing him again, I'd be sure to recognize that unless I'm dead, I'm not seeing him forevermore. 

And that's horrific ... cruel ... I wouldn't want to have to say goodbye in that way to Montie again.