Can a book about overcoming the challenges of loss and grief be breathtakingly beautiful, inspiring and deeply moving? Yes, if it is written by a woman who has been there, done that, and survived to soar above the mountaintops. Cheryl Perlitz is just that woman: a mountaineer and adventurer whose many challenges with grief transformed her outlook on life. Her book, Soaring Through Setbacks: Rise Above Adversity, Reclaim Your Life, uses lushly descriptive nature and mountain-climbing imagery to describe the many stages of suffering, grief, acceptance and renewal in a book that will touch the hearts of anyone who has ever lost a loved one, a job or career, a dream or a goal.

Using down-to-earth and deeply honest personal experience and insight, Perlitz reveals her own deep suffering when her husband, Tom, dies suddenly, followed by the death of both her parents, and the loss of her home and two beloved dogs. Her overwhelming struggle to stay alive, and afloat in a world that seems increasingly hostile, threatens to bury her in grief and despair, but this brave and bold mountain climber uses the lessons she’s learned overcoming the obstacles of the perilous climb to show the reader just what joy and transformation awaits once the peak is reached. There, she says, we can once again reclaim our lives and soar like the awesome eagle that graces the book’s cover.

Filled with wisdom, insight and even humor, this priceless book discusses many types of loss and grief, such as losing a spouse or child or a dream, or even an identity that came with a lost job or career, and offers encouragement and experience in the form of simple lessons and exercises that can help anyone move through the various stages of despair. Always, the author uses nature and the joy of being in the wild as a backdrop for the wisdom of flowing with the current of life, no matter how rough and difficult, and this powerful imagery adds to the beauty of this book’s compassionate tone and hopeful, inspiring style.

Cheryl Perlitz’s own experiences climbing the many mountains of her life, both physical and emotional, translate here into a treasure trove of useful strategies for coping with change, with challenge and with the depths of despair that often seem to threaten to swallow us up for good. The author’s tips, suggestions, ideas and anecdotes on how to SURVIVE, REVIVE and eventually THRIVE serve to prove that even the darkest of nights are always followed by a new dawn, filled with new mountains to climb.

A beautiful, beneficial and bountiful book filled to the brim with empowering hope.