Today I Have Mostly Been Reading...

When I reviewed this book on Witchgrove, I just put a single word, 'Wow!'

Usually, when I'm reading, it's during fag breaks or just before going to sleep. I slip books into the cracks in my life and get through them that way. Not so this book. My life went on hold until it was read - 780-odd pages in 3 and a half days (1 and a half of which, I was at work). I took it with me into the loo, down the Balti, shopping. I read it in corridors, on the way to the car. You name it, if my eyes weren't required for something else, they were glued to this book.

Pixie put me onto it. She registered it with Bookcrossings.com and then sent it to me. Cerr has first dibs on it next, but my Mum wants to read it first. She can't believe there's a book so good it separated me from my computer for hours on end.

It's a book about two (three-ish) academics who are researching NDEs. They are either open-minded about what they are or else have very strong, subjective views about what they are. The first thing to make me smile was the academic standards part of the questioning, because that is so my life! LOL However, it's not about academia - I've just had a heightened awareness of those issues - it's about death and messages and disasters and humanity and letting go and not letting go.

My Mum's got the book at the second, so I haven't got it to quote the first passage that made me go cold - several of them did - but it was something along the lines of Joanna (the main character) wishing that she could have held someone's hand right into death's doors, because she couldn't bear to think of them making that final journey on their own. That resonated so loudly with me, that's precisely where I was three weeks ago.

This book has got me intellectually, emotionally, spiritually... I don't just recommend it, I demand you read it. It's one of the best books I've ever read in my life.