The place I went to was real. Real in a way that makes the life we're living now completely dreamlike by comparison. What happened to me while I was in a coma is hands-down the most important story I will ever tell.

Eminent neurosurgeon Dr Eben Alexander always considered himself a man of science. His unwavering belief in evidence-based medicine fuelled a career in some of the top institutions in the world. But all this was set to change.

One morning in 2008 he fell into a coma after suffering a rare form of bacterial meningitis. Scans of his brain revealed massive damage. He was not expected to survive. As his family prepared themselves for the worst, something miraculous happened. Dr Alexander's brain went from near total inactivity to awakening. He woke a changed man, certain of the infinite reach of the soul, certain of a life beyond death.

In this astonishing book, Dr Alexander shares his experience, pieced together from notes he made as soon as he was able to write again. Unlike many other accounts of near-death experiences, he is able to explain why his brain was incapable of fabricating his journey into the afterlife.

'Proof of Heaven is a gripping story, unique in the literature of spiritual experiences, that may well change how we understand our role in the universe'
Dr Bruce Greyson, Carlson Professor of Psychiatry & Neurobehavioral Sciences, University of Virgina School of Medicine; co-editor, The Handbook of Near-Death Experiences