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Title: Alison's Gift: The Song of a Thousand Hearts Opening
ISBN: 0966817702
Author:
Pat Hogan
Publicate Date: 1999-02-21
Publish: 1999-02-21
List Price: $16.95
Average Customer Rating: 5.0
Format: Hardcover
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $4.54
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $4.68
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| Customer Review: |
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1: A book to read and pass around...
Facing the unthinkable--the sudden death of a child--this thought lurks uncomfortably in the corners of my and every parent's mind. What is the big picture of life and death, destiny, the love and role of parent and child, family, and the friendship of others? Alison's Gift is the story of the sudden death of a child of a mother that could easily be in my own circle of friends. Beth Sanders, with the support of her friends and family, follows her own intuition about how to handle the physical, emotional, and spiritual details of the crossing of her child from this life into the next. I found myself fasciinated, touched, and, yet, strengthened by the telling of this story by author, Pat Hogan. The results were a sense of inner calm and that "unthinkable" feeling subsiding. This book has that ability to show the reader how to tread down a path that we all are unsure of. It is a book to read and pass around.
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2: A Tune Nobody Will Ever Forget
Alison was a delightful and loving little girl who lost her life all too soon. Fortunately, Alison's mission, her song of peace, her vision of helping other people realize their potentials was her legacy. Although we paid the highest price with the loss of this wonderful, gifted, loving child, we did inherit her legacy. We love Alison.
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3: Courageous...
This story is the tragic account of the completely unneccessary death of a young child because of an airbag. I often found myself crying as the author spelled out some of the details of the ordeal that he and his family lived through as a result of that car accident. I found myself crying both for them and for me (because I, too, have suffered loss because of an airbag). I think that this book was probably a tremendous avenue for the author to deal with his grief, and I applaud his courage for doing so. At times, I found myself to be disturbed by the descriptions of some of the things that the family chose to do related to final arrangements for their daughter. Everyone, however, deals with grief and loss in his/her own way...and has the right to do so. Once again, courageous, but disturbing. Overall, a pretty well-written story - almost more of a journal,really. I found myself wanting more to be said about the dangers of airbags than was said. I realize, however, that the author's focus was honoring the loss of a child in his life....not "righting the wrongs" of the automotive industry. And in that, he did a good job.
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4: wonderfuly enlightening
i think mr. hogan has done a wonderful job in spinning alison's tale. a very good read!
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5: A gripping account of tragedy turned triumph.
Alison's Gift - The Song of a Thousand Hearts Opening - reads like a symphony, as the notes and chords tug at our heart-strings throughout the book, and as each "instrument" in the orchestra builds momentum adding layers of emotions and textures to an urgency . . . the urgency to unfold the true story of a child's life and death, and spiritual "resurrection". Alison's mother, Beth, embodies both the lioness mother protecting and fighting for her wounded young, and Mother Mary in Michelangelo's Pieta, as she courageously surrenders her broken heart to the acceptance of unnegotiable Death. Alison's father, Rob, suffers the tragedy by descending into a state of Inferno, where he heroically fights monsters with his aching soul and comes out with a gift of his own. Pat Hogan, as the narrator in this captivating book, leads the reader into a labyrinth of an unfathomable tragedy - a minor car accident, the explosive opening of an airbag, and the resulting loss of an innocent child. The miracle that rose from the tragedy is the transcendence over despair by a community of family, Christian Community priest, and school (teachers, parents and students alike), who together wove the golden thread that offered healing and redemption to the thousand hearts shattered. Bold, direct, and yet vulnerable, Hogan's writing trembles like earthquakes, stirring the reader's so-called calm, normal existence into inquiries beyond.
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