Comment

Jan 11, 2018vm510 rated this title 3.5 out of 5 stars
In Doughty's memoir about working in a crematory in California, she shares stories and forces the reader to debate death and Americans' aversion to it. She details some of the history of the death industry, our use of embalming, and how thinking on burial/cremation has changed over time. She does this in a humorous, entertaining, and thought-provoking way; her voice and narration, especially in the first half of the book, had me smiling and giggling. She doesn't flinch discussing dead bodies, grinding leftover bones, and standing over a body to dress it. Towards the end of the book, I found her less revealing - which is totally fine, but if you do decide to bring up something personal and devote only a couple pages to it, it will have less of an impact on me. Just for the questions it raised while reading it though, I think it's a worthwhile read.