A Delaware teenager. A deranged mass murderer. A controversial pop star.

Three people from vastly different walks of life, yet they all share one thing in common: They all smoked Salvia divinorum, the world’s most powerful naturally-occurring hallucinogenic drug.

Used for hundreds of years by Mazatec shamans in the heart of Mexico, salvia has in recent years transformed from a sacred divination tool into a YouTube spectacle and party drug, used by both Tucson shooter Jared Loughner and pop-star provocateur Miley Cyrus.

But what really goes on behind the scenes of a salvia trip? Is it a fleeting hallucination, or something more? After experiencing a salvia trip that revealed profound and terrifying revelations about the nature of reality, Jason Cole was hungry for answers. Is reality an illusion? Is consciousness? Is there another world hiding behind the façade of our everyday existence—and if so, is it heaven . . . or hell?

Part memoir, part investigation, Summer of Salvia sheds light on a little-known yet remarkably powerful drug harboring truths about the nature of existence that are at once enlightening and frightening. Though people from all walks of life have tried salvia, they all have one thing in common: After exposing themselves to the true nature of reality, their lives are never the same.

Jason Cole

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