A mistake occurs in The Place You Go After You Die, and the airman Peter Carter lives when he shouldn’t. This makes matters a bit complicated, as Peter meets a girl and falls in love in the few extra hours of life that he’s given. When asked to die a day later, Peter argues that because of someone else’s mistake, “I am now in love. I’m in an entirely different position from last night. I expected to die, I was ready to die. It’s not my fault that I didn’t.� In order to live, “Peter is forced to take himself, and the heavenly authorities, to the Universal Court of Appeal� where life and death, and the choices made in regards to them, are debated and deliberated.
In the end, as A Matter of Life and Death has two endings (one in which he lives, and one in which he dies), Peter Carter’s fate is literally decided by the toss of a coin.
A Matter of Life and Death guide sections
