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Palin's Ghost: Once homeless, an unknown author has quietly conquered the best seller list.
By Samuel P. Jacbos

Newsweek
April 17, 2011

The hottest author working today has sold more than 5 million books in the past five years. She commands top-dollar advances, and one of her most popular works is being turned into a film starring Samuel L. Jackson. The only catch: you’ve probably never heard of her.

The pearly gate crasher: Gene Weingarten goes to his reward
by Gene Weingarten, columnist

Washington Post
April 17, 2011

I am writing with good news about a new project of mine.

As you know, my first four books have not exactly sold like hot cakes, which are food items that apparently sell really well even though no one is sure what they are. My point is, whatever that hot-cake mojo is, my books haven’t had it.

All that is about to change.

I am sure you are aware that the newest craze in nonfiction involves tales of children who have died, gone to heaven and then come back to tell their fathers how swell it was there. The fathers write the books, and we buy them like hot cakes. One of these is “Heaven Is for Real.” Another is “The Boy Who Came Back From Heaven.” The author-dads of these books are, respectively, and this is straight off the book jackets, verbatim: “Todd Burpo” and “Kevin Malarkey.”

A cynic might argue that these books are being marketed to shamelessly exploit people’s hunger for spiritual reassurance in a world where a merciless death awaits us all. I, too, was initially skeptical. But two things happened to change my mind. The first was the moment I saw their sales figures, compared with mine. And the second was, well, frankly ... a miracle.

Last night, I choked to death on a malformed Cheez Doodle. And as it happened, before I returned to life, I, too, got a glimpse of heaven. My new book will be titled, “Heaven Is Even Better Than Those Kids Said.”

Abby Sunderland's courage at sea

CNN, Amercian Morning - Go to the site

Heaven and the afterlife

Guideposts - Go to the site

Los Angeles Daily News: Abby Sunderland: How teen's solo sea quest changed her
By Susan Abram, Staff writer

Dailynews.com
April 10, 2011

The sea still calls to Abby Sunderland, but these days, so do the land and sky. It's been 10 months since Sunderland was feared lost at sea after her 40-foot sailboat was damaged during a solo quest to circumnavigate the globe. Since then, her life has followed the usual course of an American teenager who is still searching for herself as she heads toward adulthood. Now 17, Sunderland has received her driver's permit. She looks forward to college, maybe to study psychology. And she said she would like one day to learn to fly airplanes. And she's also preparing to head out on a media tour to support her book and documentary to be released Tuesday. Last summer's solo sail "is pretty much behind me now," Sunderland said recently from her Thousand Oaks home. "I think it will always be a part of me, because it was such a big moment, but I'm definitely looking to the next adventure," she said.

Abby Sunderland revisits her sailing adventure and ordeal in 'Wild Eyes'
By Susan Carpenter

Los Angeles Times
April 6, 2011

Abby Sunderland is sitting barefoot aboard her brother's boat in Marina del Rey on a recent morning, her blond hair fluttering in the light breeze. The only physical evidence of the five months she traveled by herself at sea before her sailboat rolled over, ripping off her mast and soaking everything on board, is a simple rope bracelet.

The knotted white band on her left wrist was a gift from one of the French fishermen who found her last summer, officially ending her attempt to become the world's youngest sailor to circumnavigate the globe nonstop. She's dressed in a Hurley sweatshirt and skinny jeans, this California teen who last year was stranded 2,000 miles from land in the middle of the Indian Ocean on a sailboat demolished by a 50-foot rogue wave.

How can you know heaven is for real?
By Jim Fletcher

WorldNetDaily.com
April 5, 2011

In one of the most mysterious accounts from the Bible, we know that the Apostle Paul had some inkling of what heaven is like. Evidently, he decided that ambiguity served a purpose, so he wrote the following:

"I know a man in Christ who 14 years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know – God knows" (2 Corinthians 12:2)….

The last two words of that verse would serve us well today, as a plethora of books have been written about people who claim to have visited the world beyond….

Now comes a book that is causing quite a stir, "Heaven is for Real: A Little Boy's Astounding Story of His Trip to Heaven and Back." Told by Colton Burpo's father, Todd, the title is already a No. 1 New York Times bestseller

Lynn Vincent: The most successful writer you’ve never heard of
By Peter Rowe

San Diego Union-Tribune
April 2, 2011

In December 2006, William “Jerry” Boykin and Lynn Vincent met to discuss a book project — and determine who was in charge.

There should have been few doubts. A retired lieutenant general, Boykin spent a career giving orders. A former Navy petty officer, the tiny Vincent — 5-foot-3, 115 pounds — was trained to take them.

The project’s leader? No contest.

“She abused me for a year,” Boykin said Thursday. “Working with her is like having two wives, two mothers, two sergeant majors. She’s bossy, she’s a step ahead of you at every turn — and I’d work with her tomorrow in a heartbeat.”…

Everyone is dying to find out if ‘Heaven is Real’
By Michael Heaton

Cleveland Plain Dealer
April 1, 2011

I read a great little book last week called "Heaven Is For Real" by Todd Burpo. It's the nonfiction story of Burpo's 4-year-old son, Colton, and his near-death experience after an appendectomy. A year after his recovery, Colton starts casually relaying his experiences in heaven while he was on the operating table.

Colton knows what his parents were doing while he was under the knife because he was floating above them, looking down. His dad was in a broom closet yelling at God. His mom was down the hall crying on the pay phone. They are stunned he knows this.

The parents don't press their son, but the kid drops bombshells about the afterlife that range from funny to spooky. Once in the car Colton asks Todd about Todd's maternal grandfather. Todd tells his son that "Pop" died when Todd was just about the age that Colton is now. Colton replies, "Yeah, he's nice." (Colton met him in heaven and describes him in accurate detail.) Burpo, a fundamentalist minister, almost drives off the road.

Celestial Sales for Boy’s Tale of Heaven
by Julie Bosman

New York Times
Published March 11, 2011

Just two months shy of his fourth birthday, Colton Burpo, the son of an evangelical pastor in Imperial, Neb., was rushed into emergency surgery with a burst appendix.

He woke up with an astonishing story: He had died and gone to heaven, where he met his great-grandfather; the biblical figure Samson; John the Baptist; and Jesus, who had eyes that “were just sort of a sea-blue and they seemed to sparkle,” Colton, now 11 years old, recalled.

Colton’s father, Todd, has turned the boy’s experience into a 163-page book, “Heaven Is for Real,” which has become a sleeper paperback hit of the winter, dominating best-seller lists and selling hundreds of thousands of copies.

Heaven is for Real

A boy writes about his visit to Heaven at 3years old.

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Palin coauthor: Evangelical, partisan
By Ben Smith

Politico
Published 10/2/09

Sarah Palin's most consequential choice since leaving the Alaska governor's mansion may be her co-author - a staunch conservative, devoted evangelical Christian, and intensely partisan Republican from far, far outside the Beltway.