New York Times bestselling author shares views of the afterlife at Aspen Literary Fest

When New York Times bestselling author Sebastian Junger hit his late 50s, he had a near death experience that rattled his atheist worldview to the core. Being an investigative journalist, he sought answers and turned it into a book.

Junger will appear at the first-ever Aspen Literary Festival this week, taking the helm of one of the few solo panels, “On Life, Death, and What Comes After,” at 2 p.m. Sept. 28; Alisyn Camerota will moderate at the Aspen Community Church.

There will be a book signing prior to the event from 11 to 11:30 a.m. at the Headquarters Tent at the Red Brick Center for the Arts, as well as one immediately following the panel.

As the son of a scientist, Junger built his career looking at the facts.

“I don’t believe in God because I have never seen God,” he said. “I do believe in gravity because when I drop something, it falls to the ground.”

Junger first became famous when his popular 1997 nonfiction work, “The Perfect Storm,” sparked a new burst of creative nonfiction writing. The book was later made into a top-grossing film starring George Clooney and Mark Wahlberg in 2000.

For the next 20 years, Junger worked as a war correspondent. He lived in the U.S. Army’s Battle Company in Afghanistan’s Korengal Valley alongside British photojournalist Tim Hetherington on assignment for Vanity Fair. The two collaborated to create the Academy Award-nominated documentary “Restrepo,” which won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival. The film screened at the Aspen Ideas Festival that same year.

In 2011, Junger’s war reporting career ended abruptly, after learning his friend Hetherington was killed covering the Libyan civil war.

Junger moved to Massachusetts, got married to his wife, Barbara, and began raising his two young daughters and writing other successful books. He thought he was playing it safe and that his perilous moments were behind him. 

Then, in the summer of 2020, he had his closest brush with death yet: in his own driveway. A ruptured aneurysm left him bleeding internally and fading fast. It was on the brink of dying that something extraordinary happened: His deceased father appeared and shared a message with him.

This vision posed an unprecedented challenge to Junger’s worldview, so much so that Junger decided to investigate. What evolved is his latest book, “In My Time of Dying: How I Came Face to Face with the Idea of an Afterlife.” In the book, he goes through his medical turmoil, along with a logical investigation in search of meaning.

His upcoming talk will share a unique perspective for those seeking answers.

“The afterlife violates all of the laws of physics that we understand,” Junger said of the philosophical dilemma, “but it might just mean we don’t have a complete understanding of the laws of physics.”