Journeys to Home

Author Janna Benson Kontz took the job of hospice chaplain as a stopgap, filling the time until she was called to serve at a church. She had no idea that hospice work would turn out to be her true calling.

Journeys to Home presents a poignant trip across the prairie and into the heart of a hospice chaplain. These powerful stories of spirituality and faith seek to touch your heart and soul, while Kontz's simple photos capture the essence of being at peace with nature and oneself. Her stories about patients and families who have changed her deeply can draw you into their lives and change your idea of what the end of this life might look like. She shares the rhythm of the prairie in "Road Warrior," "Lyle," and "Mike" and the strength and faith of her patients in the pieces about "Fern," "Bonnie," and "Ole."

Journeys to Home takes a rare look inside the final days and moments of those who are at the end of their lives and confronts the realization that death is not a disaster to be feared but a journey to home.