"the ten best days of my life" by Adena Halpern

Okay, so I know it is just a little novel. I picked it up at the library because the description intrigued me. Here is a description of the book from the Amazon.com:

After Alex Dorenfield and her dog, Peaches, get smashed by a car, they wind up in heaven, where bubbly 29-year-old Alex is floored by how hip the digs are—especially Seventh Heaven, where Alex's dreams (of, for instance, designer clothes, an awesome house and eating without gaining weight) come true. The icing on the cake is her reunion with a few deceased family members and meeting a dreamy prospective soul mate. Only problem? She must pass an entrance exam to stay in Seventh Heaven and not be demoted to the fourth level, where she would have to live in a condo, wear last year's clothes and lose Peaches (all dogs stay in Seventh Heaven). So Alex gets to work on an essay to prove she led a worthwhile and fulfilling life.

So I started reading this book expecting a sappy little light read that would help me get some sleep. Only that is not what happened. As Alex started writing her exam about the "ten best days of her life," I started trying to decide what I would write if I was given the same exam. I ended up losing sleep.

Think about it. Alex only lived to be 29, and she had trouble coming up with just ten days. Here I am almost 50 and it is hard to choose just ten days.

You naturally start thinking the cliche days like wedding day, the day your children were born, etc. But really those are pretty stressful days. I can pick put moments of those days that made them extra special, but to call them one of the best days in my life, when I only get 10, well hold on, I'm not so sure about those full days now.

Maybe I would do better with a list of moments instead of days. Here are ten, in no particular order, but of course there are so many more.

• The look on Raymond's face when he saw our oldest being born (even though they told him not to look around the screen, and then when he held him.

• When we finally found a doctor that diagnosed Raymond after a year of agony. It did not matter how grim the diagnosis was, it just mattered that Raymond would get relief.
  
  
• The sound of my boys laughing and goofing around as they play a game together. (This happens almost every day, but the moment of the laughter and love still gets to me.)
  
  
• Going home to my parents after not seeing them for a year.
  
  
• Fishing with my dad on the Horne's dock.
  
  
• My youngest making me laugh on any given day.
  
  
• Finding a new author that I love.
  
  
• Getting a hug when I really need it.
  
  
• Hiking with Raymond at Big South Fork in KY.
  
  
• Raymond letting me use his back when the youngest was stretching my skin out so far with his kicks in the womb that I thought he would break through. Raymond would complain that it hurt, but he would still let me use his back.
  

I really enjoyed this book. I had fun with Alex learning about her life, and a good cry at the end. What more could you want from a book?