Nosso Lar (Our Home in Portuguese) is the best-selling novel by the Brazilian spiritist medium Francisco Cândido Xavier. Published in 1943, the book tells the story of the spirit of André Luiz, a prominent doctor who lived in the city of Rio de Janeiro. After dying, André Luiz encounters neither the Heaven nor the Hell depicted in the teachings he had received during his Catholic upbringing. Rather, he initially has to endure a period in the so-called umbral, a region where less-than-perfect souls face the consequences of their infelicitous actions while alive. After a while, André Luiz is able to perceive the presence of Clarêncio, a friendly spirit who had been trying to help him all along during his stay in the umbral. Clarêncio then takes André Luiz to Nosso Lar, a spirit colony, or as