Kathleen Gerard contributed "Bells and Whistles" to HOPE WHISPERS and here she shares the story behind the story:

In my twenties, I went through a series of surgeries and faced many physical challenges that made me question the meaning of my inherited religion.  I couldn't understand why (and how) a God I had worshipped my whole life, a God of love, could (and would) allow this fate to befall me -- one which kept me in a broken and physically-altered state.  Slipping deeper inside the world of disability and fearing that I was losing my faith, I searched for books that might help me deal with the spiritual implications of what I was going through -- testimonies from other people who faced physical challenges and tried to deal with them (and the range of their emotions) through the prism of their religion and spirituality. Sadly, my efforts fell short. Therefore, I decided to write the kind of book I needed to read  --  a book that seeks to answer the question, "What happens when medicine, other people, and self-reliance are no longer enough to heal the human body and sustain the human spirit?"  Forced to put my faith into practice in the laboratory of my life, I underwent a spiritual metamorphosis.  STILL   LIFE  is the by-product of that odyssey, and "Bells and  Whistles" (an excerpt from STILL LIFE, a spiritual memoir) is a story about the power of prayer and how hope can find us -- often in the middle of the night, even when we're hundreds of miles from home.

STILL LIFE (a spiritual memoir) by Kathleen Gerard is available from Amazon.com.  Below is the link:

http://www.amazon.com/Still-Life-Kathleen-Gerard/dp/1425726410/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1259111746&sr=1-3)   

Kathleen Gerard´s writing has been awarded The Perillo Prize, The Eric Hoffer Prose Award and has been nominated for "Best New American Voices," all national prizes in literature. Ms Gerard has been a contributing columnist to the “Religion and Values” section of The Record (Northern NJ’s largest daily newspaper), Our Sunday Visitor and Catholic Twin Circle magazines. Her essays have also been broadcast on National Public Radio (NPR). In addition, Ms Gerard's prose and poetry have been widely-published in literary journals and anthologies. Visit her blog at:www.kathleengerard.blogspot.com