Heaven and Earth: How It All Works by Tonya Swan not only confirms and validates near-death experiences, it goes far beyond them. It is the chronicle of two lives, life in heaven in between, and over a year of daily lessons in the etheric retreats under the tutelage of a master teacher.

The story begins with the tragic last days of Tonya's previous life in 19th-century Ireland. She describes heaven in exquisite detail and explains the major activities souls engage in: healing, resting, and reflecting, reviewing their last life, planning their next life, and preparing for reembodiment. Tonya describes how a returning soul visits old haunts on Earth before entering a baby's body. When she enters her body, she says, "I'm like a pilot checking out my plane before take off, I activate systems and organs that are not working at full capacity." Soon after being born, Tonya forgets about heaven and her plans for this life. But when she is baptized at 11, she reconnects to the feeling of unconditional love, peace, and freedom that is heaven and to a presence whom she calls God.

Six months later, after practicing a meditation involving focusing on the point between waking and sleeping, she enters a state of heightened awareness and sees the presence as a being of light with brown eyes that are soft, deep, and full of compassion. His name is Kuthumi. Kuthumi takes Tonya in her soul body to etheric cities of light in the heaven world, for lessons about life that last over a year. Tonya condenses the most important lessons she remembers into two chapters. Thanks to these lessons, she successfully navigates past pitfalls such as smoking, drugs, and alcohol and accelerates her education, enrolling in college at 16. At 19, she begins reading the lives of saints and finds a picture of Kuthumi, but the caption reads "Saint Francis of Assisi". Thus begins of her search for answers that will take her through 33 more years of her life in a future sequel.