Customer Reviews

Evacuation Plan: a novel from the hospice

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You are in a hospice, and Rod Serling walks in and asks you to tell him a story. If you had to pick one event out of your life to tell him about, what would it be? Evacuation Plan, by Texas writer Joe M. O'Connell, is a collection of stories told to the novel's protagonist, Matt, who is a screenwriter working in a hospice so he can collect material. The occupants of the hospice -- dying residents, their family members, and the hospice staff -- are like the tattoos of Ray Bradbury's Illustrated Man, each one offering a tale that stands out in their lives. Like the loser who stares at himself in childhood pictures until the pictures come to life. Or the guy who gambled his wife in a game of Monopoly at his murderer father's Christian home for the deranged. Or how fate undid the fate of a young unwed father-to-be. These are stories of reflection, of the best day in one's life, the worst day, the turning points, and the close calls, some joyous, some sad, some bizarre. Not the stuff one would discuss on a first date or a job interview. The surreal atmosphere of the hospice, where angels might be eavesdropping, drops the guard of the storytellers, and sincerity prevails. Evacuation Plan is both entertaining and thought provoking, and it is a wonderful book.

Does how you live your life reveal how you will deal with your death? If life is for the living and death is for the dying, then somewhere in between must be hospice.

Aspiring screenwriter Matt volunteers at a local hospice facility in search of a good story for his screenplay. What he discovers is that the stories of peoples' lives, like memories drifting in the ether, haunt the halls and rooms like the music from the violinist who plays for the residents.

While the architect Mr. Wright and his family's story is the focal point of Matt's attention, the reader also peers almost voyeuristically into the past lives of everyone he encounters. There's the guy in the hall who screwed up his life so miserably all he has left to look forward to his taking over his dying mother's house. The mortician who lost everything before he even knew what he had. The male nurse who watched his sister die from a broken heart. O'Connell weaves the characters' stories together to create an intimate mosaic that reveals how we are all connected by the mysteries of life and death.

In Matt's dream the banjo player jokes, "Know the difference between death and an electric eel? People aren't afraid to talk about electric eels." In "Evacuation Plan", death is as much a character as it is a resident at the hospice. But this book is no funereal dirge. Instead, O'Connell has employed masterful storytelling skills to compose an achingly captivating symphony from all these life stories that could very possibly change the way you view your own life - and death.

Evacuation Plan by Joe O'Connell was a riveting read, but in a natural, unforced way that, very much like life itself, draws us into the suspense and wonder of everyday things and everyday people facing great struggles in courageous ways. This book is gentle, deep, and meaningful, weaving together the lives (and deaths) of many diverse characters in a merciful, but painfully honest search for answers to life, death, love, family, hope, disappointment, and watching your parents die.

It was very hard for me to put this book down. It carries us through the deepest meaning in life and most painful, most hopeful memories for a wide range of fascinating characters. Based in a hospice, this book could have easily resorted to cheap sensationalism, or whacked us upside the head with stereotypic melodrama, but instead it was respectful, honest, and tender. The characters will stay with you - you may even recognize some of them within your own life.

Death is not a topic that most people like to talk about or write about. It makes us uncomfortable, but Joe M. OConnell puts that discomfort aside and brings us a book that is sometimes poignant and sometimes irreverent, but always entertaining.

Matt, a screenwriter, volunteers in a hospice so he can meet people and gather material for a story worthy of film. Will he write about old Mr. Wright, dying of cancer? Or perhaps his son. Or maybe his daughter. Then, too, there is the nurse and her story.

What Matt discovers is that everyone's life stands for something, and how well we have lived may have some bearing on how well we leave this world.

Written in a series of stories, with all the characters loosely connected through the hospice, the book is as much about the living as the dying. It is written with grace and humor, and the characters are compelling.

I was a bit surprised that the book was not focused more on the journey of death, but then I realized at the end that we are all on that journey from the moment we are born.

I didnt want the book to end. Having lost my own mother recently in a hospice I was hesitant about reading this book. However the truly wonderful feelings one can have seeing your loved one slip to a most beautiful place was brought back to me reading Mr. O'Connells words.
I was so moved by his words I plan to recommend this wonderful piece of work to the priest who oversees the volunteers who grace the halls of Hopewell House in Portland, Oregon. Thank you for your incredible book.

Aspiring script writer Matt visits a hospice in order to gather inspiration for his great play. Spending the days getting to know the people staying there, Matt realized the hospice is full of stories, for anybody who cares enough to sit down and listen. From the lady whose sister ran off with a circus artist (or wanted to, anyway) to the old man who was just hoping to be reconciled with his children before he left this earth, Matt talks to them all, asking them what was their best experience in life, and hearing the stories they just have to get off their chest-before it's too late.

The idea behind Evacuation Plan is brilliant. Joe O'Connell works from the theory that "everybody has a story to tell," and you are left with the knowledge that this is without a doubt true. The book changes focus constantly with the chapters alternatingly being told from Matt's point of view, and then from the view of one of the people at the hospice.

The main thread running through all the stories is death and how to cope with it, but this is not a strong enough connection to get the stories linked together properly, and Evacuation Plan ends up feeling more like a book of short stories with a common theme, than like a full novel. This doesn't make the book any less worth reading, but it is always an advantage for the reader to know what to expect, in order not to be disappointed by the number of loose threads left hanging.

Though dealing with a sober subject, Joe O'Connell manages to be neither too somber nor engage in too much gallows humor. Death is faced unapologetically and straightforward-a very refreshing change from books that tend to either shy away from the subject, or wallow in it.

Armchair Interviews says: This is more a collection of well-written short stories than a novel, with the thread that connects are the stories at the hospice.

I was just blown away ... so rich and so well done on so many levels. Joe O'Connell takes us to a place we want to avoid like the plague and reveals the warmest and most meaningful moments in life. Truly a treasure to curl up with.

You might think a book set mostly in a place where people go to die sounds like no fun, but actually, it's one of the things we all have in common. Dying, that is. Joe O'Connell mines this setting for all its worth, revealing a cast of quirky and very human characters, full of life, ironically, even thought they're at death's door.

In his superb novel, Evacuation Plan, author Joe O'Connell lays down a style as shape-shifting as any Celtic Myth. We are at once in a hospice, with all of its grief, tenderness and pain, and in a suburban garage playing truth or dare with a hand sneaking down the lip of our trousers.

Our hero, Matt, is a screenwriter visiting a city hospice in search of material for his new project. Quietly, respectfully, he begins to mine the passions, foibles and follies of the patients, often bonding with them like family, or closer. They lay down the fences, the defenses, and open their hearts to the young writer. "The tears started again when I saw Sara sitting there, pretending to read a magazine. She saw me and reached out. We were not really a hugging family, but, I thought, maybe its not too late to start, and wrapped my arms around her."

Segue this into the following: "While Papa was gone, Mama went to dances most every night. She said her feet couldn't stay still. When Papa returned , he and Mama didn't leave their room. Sometimes they yelled at each other, but mostly they pinched each other for fun. 'Your Papa thinks I'm his instrument and he can squeeze me any time he wants,' Mama would say and then wink. 'He doesn't know who is really conducting this orchestra.'

O'Connell's book is spiritual, whimsical, profane...take your choice. Writing doesn't get much better than this.

Gary Kent, film writer/director, author of Shadows and Light/Journeys With Outlaws In Revolutionary Hollywood.

EVACUATION PLAN brought me to tears at several moments throughout the book. It's dark beauty and poetic interpretation of our struggle to embrace and accept death is heart wrenching in its honesty. A true work of art and a novel that O'Connell should be tremendously proud of!