'Nancy Mairs writes knowingly, even lovingly, about a subject most of us seek to avoid: death and its essential place in life. Her gripping meditations. . . both comfort and provoke with their spiritual strength and hard-won wisdom.' -O Magazine

'The ten essays in Nancy Mairs's A Troubled Guest . . . radiate the truest kinds of insight about life, illness, death, and above all, love.' -Elle Magazine 'Through these evocative and often affecting essays, Mairs charts a territory that defines the corporeal and the spiritual, delineating as much about how we live as how we die.' -Publishers Weekly 'In clear, unaffected prose that quickly establishes -along with her candor-an intimacy with the reader, Mairs begins by explaining her feelings toward her own impending death. . . . Not self-help by any stretch, but it will be of interest to anyone recently touched by death.' -Kirkus Reviews On Ordinary Time: 'A conversion from good-girl spirituality to something much deeper and darker. . . . A remarkable accomplishment. . . . A relentlessly physical writer, as fiercely committed to her art as to her spiritual development.' -Kathleen Norris, The New York Times Book Review On Carnal Acts: 'Eloquent and remarkable. . . . I closed Carnal Acts feeling a hundred times more prepared for whatever perils and joys lie ahead of me.' -Barbara Kingsolver