The darkest hours a soul can endure are brilliantly illuminated in paintings and their descriptions in this very unusual of books. A physical attack while at work in one of California's beautiful state parks plunged Christina Miller into the terrifying world of mental disintegration. Over the next five years she painted, often graphically, the intense and excruciating existence she was drawn into. Her images are not for the timid, as they lay out the altered states of fear, anguish, despair and finally relief. The paintings are deeply symbolic, filled with color, directness and a surprising sense that the painful images seem all too familiar. This book is for those who find themselves in a similar circumstance; or those that might have a loved one that is likewise suffering. "Altered Landscapes" cracks the door for the psychiatric community to view the strange world that they hear their patients talk about but rarely visit themselves.