The Gift by Cecelia Ahern

I read the book “The Gift” for the first time in the Starbucks section of a bookshop in Bangkok somewhere back in November 2009. I remember tearing up at the end of the book and going out of the shop with a lump in my throat. This is the second time I’ve read the book and it still has exactly the same effect.

The Slog Reviews: 8.5/10. The story in short is about a man, Lou, who is a very busy man trying to do two things simultaneously at every single moment. 1 of the two things is always work-related where he is trying to get ahead. “Lou had spent so many years moving so quickly through the minutes, hours and days, through the moments, that he’d stopped noticing life. The looks, gestures and emotions of other people had since stopped being important or visible to him. Passion had driven him at first, and then, while on his way to the somewhere he wanted to be, he’d left it behind.” Anyway, on impulse, he gives a job to a “man” named Gabe who is homeless. Through Gabe, he learns how to make time for his family and slow down just a bit. Gabe also gives him a pill which is supposed to allow him to be in two places at a time. Anyway, Lou dies in the end in a car crash, but is given the last of the pill by a police-woman who arrives at the scene which allows him to be with his family for one last night where he asks for forgiveness and tells them how much they mean to him.

I like these parts of the book:

1. The lesson of the story. Appreciating your loved ones. Acknowledging all the special people in your life. Concentrate on what’s important.

2 Time is more precious than money, more precious than anything. Because you can never earn more time. Once an hour goes by, a week, a month, a year, you’ll never get them back. Lou was running out of time and Gabe gave him more, to help tie things up, to finish things properly. That’s the gift. So we should fix things before it’s too late.

3. One thing of great importance can affect a small number of people Equally so, a thing of little importance can affect a multitude. Either way, a happening – big or small – can affect an entire string of people. Occurrences can join us all together. You see, we’ll all made up of the same stuff. When something happens, it triggers something inside us that connects us to a situation, connects us to other people…A lesson finds the common denominator and links us all together like a chain. AT the end of that chain dangles a clock…enough time leaves us warm; when our time is gone, it too leaves us cold.

4. Time is more precious than gold, more precious than diamonds, more precious than oil or valuable treasures. It is time we do not have enough of, it is time that causes the war within our hearts, and so we must spend it wisely. Time can’t be given. But it can be shared.