Book excerpt: This book is a composite overview of details of heaven from fifty published eyewitness testimonies of heaven. All of these testimonies are combined with regard to many facets of heaven and are presented side by side to give a more complete picture of each detail of heaven than any single eyewitness account gives. The description of the illness or accident that caused the authors to die temporarily and their subsequent recovery are omitted so only the heaven experiences are given. As a result, this book's description of heaven is more direct, detailed, and extensive than that of any other book.Because so many testimonies are considered, the consistencies in these accounts gives support for their authenticity. Since different people see things differently, it also gives a more accurate picture than any one person's experience can give. John Burke's Imagine Heaven comes the closest to be an alternative reference. But while Burke includes some of the same sources I have used, he summarizes what he has learned from all of them and occasionally gives a lengthy quotation from one of his sources. He also deals with NDE's in general, while I limit my focus to actual descriptions of heaven or hell. This book gives in paraphrase what each relevant author said about the feature in question. This allows the reader to formulate his or her own idea from the data rather than accepting someone else's analysis. It makes the reader closer to the actual experience of heaven than does John Burke's analysis. Perhaps the best single experience is that of Richard Sigmund, My Time in Heaven, who was dead for eight hours before resuscitating. He described more of heaven than any other single author I have read. But even so, seeing his description side by side with that of others gives a clearer picture than does just his one testimony.In addition, the bibliography is annotated so the reader can tell what each book is like. For every description given throughout the book, the author and page reference are given for the source of that statement. This enables the reader to go to the author's description and read it directly. In that sense, this book is like an encyclopedia of heaven.It also includes nineteen testimonies of hell from people who went there when they temporarily died, or, in some cases, when they went to heaven but Jesus wanted them to see the alternative. Seeing both the beauty, joy, love, peace, fullness, relationships, and all of heaven and the solitude, torture, fear, hate, evil, and all of hell, should make one determined to choose the way to the Father and His Kingdom rather that the way of Satan and the angels who rebelled against God's authority. This is indeed the experience of all those who witnessed hell. They are determined NEVER to return to that place.