If Minds Had Toes; Lucy Eyre

Fifteen-year-old Ben Warner is dizzy with boredom working at his local fish and chips shop. One evening, a young woman saunters in and, between mouthfuls of chips, invites him to visit her in the World of Ideas. Ben is excited, but suspicious. The World of Ideas is the philosopher's quarter of the afterlife, and adorable Lila has been residing there for thirty years, but being dead is just the start of her problems.

Lila's boss, Socrates, President of the World of Ideas for the last 2,109 years, has made a bet with his rival, Wittgenstein, that philosophy can improve your life. If Socrates loses he cedes the presidency to his crabby nemesis. For the wager, they choose Ben as their unwitting guinea pig, and Lila's mission is to prove to him that his life—annoying sisters, adolescent blues, smarmy boss and all—can be changed fundamentally for the better through philosophy. So begins a mind-bending guided tour through the big questions in life. When is orange not orange? Do we have free will? Does time speed up when your heart beats faster? Charming and full of wit and humor, Lucy Eyre's If Minds Had Toes warmly shows that few other questions—how we live and whether our lives have meaning—are more important.

January 1, 2007