A Walk Through the Dark: How My Husband's 90 Minutes in Heaven Deepened My Faith for a Lifetime by Eva Piper

With one of the longest subtitles ever, A Walk Through the Dark:  How My Husband's 90 Minutes in Heaven Deepened My Faith for a Lifetime by Eva Piper gives us the other side of the story to the popular book 90 Minutes in Heaven by her husband, Don Piper.

Told by Eva with the help of Cecil Murphey (who also co-wrote Don Piper's book), this book chronicles Eva's experience of hearing about Don's terrible car accident, his recovery process and eventually the story of how he died and went to heaven and was "prayed back" to earth.  It tells of her personal struggles, what she felt and how she responded to having a husband who was severely injured and underwent a lengthy and painful recovery.

I enjoyed the first part of the book, where it tells of how Eva found out about the car accident and her experiences watching Don struggle.  I found it to be a good look into what spouses and caregivers of those severely injured go through and I haven't found that to be a popular perspective in memoirs.  Typically memoirs are about the injured person, not those who have to watch and support the recovery without actually having any control. 

However, I thought that Eva did a bit too much defending of her choices and decisions.  The second half of the book felt a bit defensive at times and a bit preachy too.  I come from a church background so the vernacular was familiar to me, but at times it seemed a bit too Christian cliché for my taste.  However, I have never undergone a similar situation and I am not faulting her responses or emotions at all, just the style in which the book was written.  She is brave to tell her story and I have to give her that.  It just wasn't my favorite style of memoir writing.

All in all, this book was a good companion book to 90 Minutes in Heaven and I think would be a good read for anyone who has been a caregiver for someone with a life-threatening and lengthy illness.