As an emergency room doctor, Harper is acutely aware of her closeness to death. She opens the book with the image of cradling a patient’s head in her hands, accentuating her responsibility to help save human lives. In acknowledging the fragility of life, which can leave the human body in an instant, Harper is not self-aggrandizing or hyperbolizing the importance of her role as a doctor. Rather, she’s simply acknowledging the reality of being a doctor: “I claim no special powers; nor do I know how to handle death any better than you” (xii). Harper does not cast herself as a superhero who gracefully and wisely navigates the tension between life and death, but as a mere human who has accepted the calling of the medical profession—and who herself is susceptible to life’s fragility.

Rather than offering a montage of Harper’s “greatest hits” as an emergency room physician, the book seeks to provide an in-depth look at the constant challenges that doctors face as they try to save lives while dealing with the broken parts of their own lives. When Harper began working as an emergency room physician, her personal life was in turmoil because her marriage was ending.