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More copies of this ISBN:This title in other formats:Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadaversby Mary Roach
Staff Pick
In her remarkable debut, Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers, Mary Roach explored what happens to the body after death, and in the process brought the corpse to glittering life. In her follow up, she stakes out similar terrain. What happens to the soul after death? And how can you tell? This time her subject is more elusive. Still, though Roach may not arrive at clear answers, she is such a consistently fascinating and entertaining writer, hard facts are decidedly beside the point. Synopses & ReviewsPublisher Comments:Stiff is an oddly compelling, often hilarious exploration of the strange lives of our bodies postmortem. For two thousand years, cadavers (some willingly, some unwittingly) have been involved in science's boldest strides and weirdest undertakings. They've tested France's first guillotines, ridden the NASA Space Shuttle, been crucified in a Parisian laboratory to test the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin, and helped solve the mystery of TWA Flight 800. For every new surgical procedure, from heart transplants to gender reassignment surgery, cadavers have been there alongside surgeons, making history in their quiet way.
In this fascinating, ennobling account, Mary Roach visits the good deeds of cadavers over the centuries; from the anatomy labs and human-sourced pharmacies of medieval and nineteenth-century Europe to a human decay research facility in Tennessee, to a plastic surgery practice lab, to a Scandinavian funeral directors' conference on human composting. In her droll, inimitable voice, Roach tells the engrossing story of our bodies when we are no longer with them. From Our Staff:I picked up Stiff after hearing Mary Roach read from her book. She really has a light
touch when dealing with a subject most of society would find distasteful. She also
has a wry sense of humor that manages to leave the dignity of the dead wholly
intact. In the first chapter, "A Head Is a Terrible Thing to Waste," she sees the similarity in size between a human head and a stewing chicken; it's something she never would have thought of but for the fact that the surgeons practicing on these heads were using
disposable aluminum baking trays to contain them... an interesting observation I
will not forget. This book is fun, intriguing, instructional, and oddly sweet. The
dead have much to teach us. Review:"Fascinating, unexpectedly fresh and funny look at the multiplicity of ways in which cadavers benefit the living....Informative, yes; entertaining, absolutely." Kirkus Reviews (Starred Review) Review:"Roach's dry, irreverent wit makes for a delightful — though never disrespectful — read." Les Simpson, Time Out New York Review:"[A] book as informative and respectful as it is irreverent and witty....Even Roach's digressions and footnotes are captivating, helping to make the book impossible to put down." Publishers Weekly (Starred Review) Review:"A laugh-out-loud funny book.... Review:"As weird as the book gets, Roach manages to convey a sense of respect and appreciation for her subjects." Los Angeles Times Review:"One of the funniest and most unusual books of the year....Gross, educational, and unexpectedly sidesplitting." Entertainment Weekly Review:"Roach displays her metier in tangents about bizarre incendents in pathological history. Death may have the last laugh, but, in the meantime, Roach finds merriment in the macabre." Gilbert Taylor, Booklist Review:"Fascinating and oddly fun." San Francisco Chronicle Review:"Acutely entertaining, morbidly fascinating." Forbes Review:"Our own instinctive discomfort with death provides fodder for Roach's dry sense of humor throughout the book." Ana Marie Cox, The Washington Post Review:"Roach exhibits both a keen sense of humor and a sincere respect for the dearly departed." American Scientist Review:"Roach's conversational tone and her gallows humor bring her subjects to life....Morbidly entertaining." Alex Abramovich, People Magazine Review:"Roach...goes into gruesome detail, but she also succeeds in not making the subject at hand too morbid." Kim Colton, Willamette Week (Portland, OR) Review:"As fascinating as it is funny....The research is admirable, the anecdotes carefully chosen, and the prose lively; and they combine to produce a book that everyone in the health care field should have to read, and everyone else will want to." Caleb Carr, author of The Alienist Review:"Droll, dark, and quite wise, Stiff makes being dead funny and fascinating and weirdly appealing." Susan Orlean, author of The Orchid Thief Synopsis:Oddly compelling and often hilarious, Roach visits the good deeds of cadavers over the centuries and tells the engrossing story of our bodies when we are no longer with them. About the AuthorMary Roach's writing has appeared in Salon, Wired, Outside, GQ, Discover, Vogue, and the New York Times Magazine; her column, "My Planet," appears monthly in Reader's Digest. She lives in San Francisco. Table of ContentsIntroduction 9 1 A Head is a Terrible Thing to Waste: Practicing surgery on the dead 19 2 Crimes of Anatomy: Body snatching and other sordid tales from the dawn of human dissection 37 3 Life After Death: On human decay and what can be done about it 61 4 Dead Man Driving: Human crash test dummies and the ghastly, necessary science of impact tolerance 87 5 Beyond the Black Box: When the bodies of the passengers must tell the story of a crash 113 6 The Cadaver Who Joined the Army: The sticky ethics of bullets and bombs 131 7 Holy Cadaver: The crucifixion experiments 157 8 How to Know if You're Dead: Beating-heart cadavers, live burial, and the scientific search for the soul 167 9 Just a Head: Decapitation, reanimation, and the human head transplant 199 10 Eat Me: Medicinal cannibalism and the case of the human dumplings 221 11 Out of the Fire, into the Compost Bin: And other new ways to end up 251 12 Remains of the Author: Will she or won't she? 281 Acknowledgments 293 Bibliography 295 What Our Readers Are SayingAdd a comment for a chance to win!
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