After The Icu

Dr. Penny Sartori is a registered nurse who began researching Near Death Experiences (NDEs) in 1995 after one of her long-term intensive care patients begged her to let him die in peace. The event shook her deeply and eventually led her to enroll in a PhD program to research NDEs. The findings, along with the profound spiritual lessons that she has gleaned from her work, are published here.

Set during the time of the Second Sino-Japanese War, Caterpillar tells the story of a Japanese soldier who returns home horrifically mutilated. Liutenant Kurokawa is literally nothing but a human torso: he has lost both his arms and legs, and with burns covering half his face, he is also unable to speak. His wife, Shigeko (Shinobu Terajima), is given the grueling task of looking after him, which, in addition to feeding and washing him, includes the job of satisfying his sexual desires – impulses that remain as strong as ever in spite of his disabled condition. Taught to be dutiful and to do her part for her country, Shigeko bears her burden – but as she realizes that her husband's life lies entirely in her hands, she begins to question the role she has accepted.

"Emotional Orphans tells the sad and moving stories of a number of lost children, young ones who had suffered abuse and abandonment and who had learned in consequence that trust in others was their most bitter enemy. In this wonderful book, Dr. Shepherd describes her clinical work and gives us moving accounts of her inspiring successes and her heartbreaking failures. She also opens up her own trauma history, and allows us to see how the wounds carried by the healer play an indispensable role in the process of healing itself. This book should be read by every student and clinician who seeks to open the darkness of mistrust to the power of human understanding and connection." - George Atwood, Ph.D., author, The Abyss of Madness

The threatening midnight calls followed Dr. Elena Gardner from one city to another, prolonging her grief. Even worse, they are echoed by the whispers of her own colleagues. Whispers that started after her comatose husband died in the ICU . . . then another mysterious death during her training. When a third happens at her new hospital, the whispers turn into a shout: “Mercy killer!”