Part 1 covers the lives of the young Graham and Audrie (Aud) Martin, how we got hitched, the beginnings of our spiritual journeys, and then gradually follows on to how, at 60 years old, I experienced a complete mental breakdown involving multiple attempts to take my own life and a 12-week spell in a secured psychiatric unit. It is intended that my recollections of this truly horrendous time, and particularly how I survived, will enable anyone presently undergoing anything remotely similar to have genuine hope. Every tunnel, no matter how dark, has a light at the end when Christ is involved, even if this cannot be perceived at the time. Back in the day, as a young man, I had strong atheistic views and consistently believed the Bible to be a load of rubbish right up until the time I read it. This aggressive and confrontational approach persisted until my mid-twenties when, after a long struggle, God immediately answered my 'exploratory prayer' to convert my best friend, Bill Collins, who was living in California at the time. Audrie, who was less feisty than me when it came to spiritual matters, also experienced a fairly dramatic conversion to Christ in her mid-twenties, although her encounter came out of a place of despair rather than comfort.

Graham Martin is a retired civil engineer and although this is his first actual book (assuming a bound MSc dissertation doesn't count), the fact that he has produced numerous related reports means that he is very used to writing English, albeit in a somewhat different genre. In addition, Graham worked as an expert witness for various clients, including Railtrack/ Network Rail has honed his research and summarising skills. Finally, this book has enabled him to periodically indulge his penchant for writing humour, which has thus far been limited to speech-making. Graham has been married to the amazing Audrie (Aud), who he met in his home town of Torquay, for 43 years and have two grown-up children, Kevin and Rachel, plus two cats. Kev (Equity name, Kai) is a very successful stunt-man, having doubled for Daniel Craig in the last 5 Bond movies, and Rach and her husband Kam have a brilliant 4-year old son Leon and a gorgeous 21 month old daughter, Jasmine ('Jazy'). Graham became a Christian in 1977, having previously been a strident and mocking atheist. Audrie, who was more of an agnostic than an atheist, converted to Christ in 1980. My hobbies include sport (Aud and Graham both belong to a gym), Theology and Science.