• To Heaven and Back

  • A Doctor's Extraordinary Account of Her Death, Heaven, Angels, and Life Again: A True Story
  • By: Mary C. Neal MD
  • Narrated by: Rebecca Lowman
  • Length: 4 hrs and 42 mins
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars (1,107 ratings)

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To Heaven and Back  By  cover art

To Heaven and Back

By: Mary C. Neal MD
Narrated by: Rebecca Lowman
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Publisher's summary

A kayak accident during a South American adventure takes one woman to heaven — where she experienced God’s peace, joy, and angels — and back to life again.

In 1999 in the Los Rios region of southern Chile, orthopedic surgeon, devoted wife, and loving mother Dr. Mary Neal drowned in a kayak accident. While cascading down a waterfall, her kayak became pinned at the bottom and she was immediately and completely submerged. Despite the rescue efforts of her companions, Mary was underwater for too long, and as a result, died.

To Heaven and Back is Mary’s remarkable story of her life’s spiritual journey and what happened as she moved from life to death to eternal life, and back again. Detailing her feelings and surroundings in heaven, her communication with angels, and her deep sense of sadness when she realized it wasn’t her time, Mary shares the captivating experience of her modern-day miracle.

Mary’s life has been forever changed by her newfound understanding of her purpose on earth, her awareness of God, her closer relationship with Jesus, and her personal spiritual journey suddenly enhanced by a first-hand experience in heaven. To Heaven and Back will reacquaint you with the hope, wonder, and promise of heaven, while enriching you own faith and walk with God.

©2012 Mary C. Neal M.D. (P)2012 Random House

What listeners say about To Heaven and Back

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Disappointed

What disappointed you about To Heaven and Back?

I want to believe this doctor's story is true, but this pious pap only turns me off. There is nothing real about this doctor, her family and her faith.

What do you think your next listen will be?

I'm listening to Defending Jacob

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2 people found this helpful

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A book about religion

so yeah, I have listen to the start of the book and all the god talk makes it hard to listen to. I'm still no where near the NDE part of the story yet and already it's all about god this and god that. If I wanted this much god I would have read the bible, so this turned out to be a hard listen. sadly I won't get to the NDE part when all this book is about is god. Every little thing that happens in this book she believes is god. It's just too much! So, unless you are a god freak like this author you won't like this book. It is disappointing, but it is what it is.

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1 person found this helpful

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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Happy to Hear My Lost Book on Audio

My husband lost my paperback of this book when my house was being renovated. I looked it up on Amazon & was thankful to see it was on audio. I read, I mean listened, to the whole book TODAY (even though I had already read the first 3-4 chapters previously) because of the nice voice that read it and all the ups and downs in the book. It was so well written that I couldn’t put it (my phone) down and only took a few breaks. I wish I could find the book to pass it on to my mom and then the church.

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A fascinating read....

Don't miss this fascinating read of a woman's spiritual journey. She goes from being a teen with a purely academic knowledge of what she's been taught to a woman with a vibrant, active faith. If you read this just for the "what's heaven like" experience you'll be disappointed as it's relatively short. It's all the adventure leading up to it and how God changed her entire life that will captivate you. Because she is an adventurous person and one who is not content with a mundane life, her story weaves in many experiences where God showed up in unmistakeable ways. If you are seeking to know God in a deeper, more meaningful way, this book will be encouraging to you.

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Great story here, but not in this book!

I found this book dissappointing in the fact that the description of her trip to heaven was minimal and from what she told of it I didn't consider it a trip to heaven at all. I purchased this book because it was the book of the month for a Christian book club I am in and felt less than inspired by the theology she expresses but what did intrigue me was the actual story of her accident.
At the end of the audio book there were some questions and answers and she said she didn't understand why so many people inquired about her actual injuries to her legs. But the real miracles in this story were that not only was she revived after drowning but that she also survived her trip back to the United States with two broken legs and a disorder of her lungs that should have killed her within 48 hours and yet it took longer than that to get to the hospital in the United States. Also, after breaking her legs the way she did it seems miraculous that she is even walking again, let alone skiing. However, because she doesn't elaborate on any of these facts, the story seemd to have so many holes that I found myself not believing what happened after her accident. I couldn't picture how she even got on the planes to get back to the United States seeing that she couldn't have been walking and I couldn't visualize the splints her husband put on her in such a way that didn't make her legs so that they wouldn't bend. And how did he carry her on and off the plane if they couldn't bend?
I also think the story of her flying to her father's funeral 2 weeks after she got out of the hospital in casts on both legs from her ankle to her groin with no one flying with her is a story in itself. How do you even sit in a wheelchair like that let alone get in and out of it to sit on a plane? And the conflicting emotions she must have been feeling at the awkwardness of her physical situation along with the loss of her father and the anger at her step mother, yet from what she wrote, I did not get any sense of this at all. I felt this could have been a really good story but not from the way she told it.

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Not what I expected

Details of her NDE only made up a small portion of her story; scripture references and religious-speak filled the rest of the book. I would've preferred a more spiritual-not-religious approach.

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    5 out of 5 stars
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Enlightening

This book was a great comfort to me as I am experiencing some rather serious health issues right now,

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Very oriented towards Christians

I saw Dr. Neal on a Netflix special and was fascinated by her story - so I dropped a credit on her book. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to make it through but a few chapters - there were just too many references to the Bible, Jesus, etc. and no indication that she was going to get to her NDE anytime soon. If you’re super-duper Christian, you might find this inspirational. However, it does seem to alienate those of different faiths along with those who are simply spiritual, but not religious. Because it’s exclusively geared towards those of the Christian faith, I do wish there was something in the title of the book that said that this was a book written exclusively for Christians. Again, I’m sure many Christians will enjoy Dr. Neal’s books but I feel duped into spending a Credit on material that I just can’t relate to. If the author reads these reviews, I encourage you to please indicate somewhere on the cover of your books that they are geared toward a Christian audience.

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    5 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Going to Heaven

Highly Inspiring. TRUTH. Comforting and healing. Real
in all aspects. Informative on the Spiritual Journey to
Heaven.

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Incredible

A very well written story. A beautiful and encouraging story of love, hope, faith and courage

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