Thanks to all of you who entered our When You Reach Me Giveaway. 48 entered, but only 5 could win. I used a random number generator to pick our winners. Congratulations to Denise, Lena, Gwendolyn, Erin and Linda. Your books will be in the mail within the next few days!

We received so many wonderful book choices for the book you’d carry around with you. We’ll occasionally publish one or two here on the blog, so watch for those. In the meantime, here are the entires from our five winners:

Lena – The book I would carry with me is Aldous Huxley’s Time Must Have a Stop.
The novel is his finest by far. Its most important theme for me is that of being incapable
to always handle problems but trying anyway (even if you fail). The story seems relatively simplistic – poor Sebastian Barnack – but embedded in it are important dialogues about morality and Huxley’s philosophy on… practically everything. I’ve probably read it a
hundred times

Denise – I could not possibly pick one. Here are my possibilities:
Wicked by Gregory Maquire. It is a quick and funny read and everytime I read it, I seem to focus in on different parts. Once I will notice the humor, next the sage wisdom, of course the politics.
The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan. I am not sure why but at least once a year I pick this book up and do not read anything else until I am finished. The characters seem so genuine. While nothing in my background is remotely similar, I feel absolutely connected to each of them.

Gwendolyn – And it’s funny that you should ask what book we could carry around with us and read 100 times. I’ve felt that way about more than one book, but recently mentioned on my blog (A Sea of Books) that after I read and reread Same Place, Same Things: Stories by Tim Gautreaux, I continued to carry it around with me just to keep the characters close! I’ve also carried around Lao Tzu’s Tao Te Ching for months at a time because I can always dip into it and find something meaningful and inspirational.

Erin – It’s a bit cliche, but I would carry around Pride and Prejudice (original flavour, not zombie-filled). Aside from being a wonderfully romantic novel (and sexy, if you close your eyes and picture Colin Firth), it combined social commentary with some seriously funny writing – Jane Austen has a wicked sense of humour! And of course, Elizabeth Bennet is one of my favourite literary characters ever created. Reading Pride and Prejudice as a child, she embodied everything I wanted to grow up to be: clever, strong-willed, loving…

and finally, a truly wonderful and inspiring story. Though the choosing of winners was completely random, I was thrilled to see that Linda won. This is a testament to the power of books and showcases someone who’s a true advocate for her favorite book:

Linda – The book I would carry with me is Mitch Albom’s Tuesdays with Morrie. I read this book 10 years ago. I was at the nadir of a clinical depression. I was suicidal, erroneously thinking it would be the remedy for the narcissistic manipulative principal I taught under. A colleague recognized my predicament. With her help, the school psychologist and my own psychologist’s recommendations, I was placed on two weeks mental health leave. Tuesdays with Morrie was the first book I read during that time off. That book saved my life.
Morrie was a man who believed as I did. I was reaffirmed to know I was not the only one in the world to feel as I did.
I was so enthralled with the book that I either bought copies for the three people who rescued me or lent my copy to them. I put a long post-it note in the front of my original copy so anyone who has read the book will sign it. I can track where the book has been. There have been others who I have sent the book to friends and relatives who are not proximate to me. All, except one, have sent a note or an e-mail thanking me for sharing Mitch and Morrie’s wonderful story.
I am an avid thrift-store-shopper. Whenever I see a copy of Tuesdays with Morrie on the bookshelf, I rescue it from oblivion. This has allowed me to share the book with more than one person at a time.
Two years ago, the book was required reading for my son’s junior English class. Son told his buddies, “You don’t have to buy this book. My mom has enough copies for almost this whole class!” I was able to supply his group of friends, but not the whole class.
I have met Mitch Albom at book signings and even traveled to Detroit for the movie premier of Tuesdays. It was a number of years before Mitch and my original copy of the book were available to me at the same time. He looked at my obviously well-read copy and commented, “That’s what an author’s eyes like to see.”

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