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| | Book Description |
| An oddly compelling, often hilarious forensic 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. 13 b/w illustrations. |
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| | REVIEWS FROM AMAZON.COM | | Don't take life too seriously - you'll never get out alive |
Mary Roach's tongue-in-cheek writing style takes"taboo" topics and makes them a pleasurable read. Her attitude is not in the least bit disrespetful but takes cues, in general, from the medical profession where an over-familiarity with the body, life, and death creates a morbid sense of humor.
Stiff is a wonderful book for any reader but makes an especially great book to get high schoolers interested in biology and anatomy/physiology. Of course, the same holds true for making college courses a little more interesting.
Although I have not seen much mention of it in, Stiff is also a bit of a "how-to" guide. Roach's research gives enough information that the reader can really consider where they would like their body to be after death. (I had no idea I could be art!)
I can't imagine anyone not finding this book fascinating but if you like Six Feet Under, Dead Like Me, or any of the dozens of forensics shows on cable nowadays, you should absolutely read this book.
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| Nervous Humor |
Fans of the HBO series "Six Feet Under" will recall that Lisa's niece Michaela kept trying to give this book to David, the funeral director. I had been vaguely aware of this book when it came out 2 years ago but my interest was rekindled when the 4th season of 6FU was released on DVD this summer.
The connection with 6FU is apropos. Both share a morbid fascination with and a nervous humor about death, and both are wildly entertaining because they skirt the bounds of propriety.
One more television comparison: on the Discovery Channel series "Mythbusters" they use a crash test dummy, nicknamed "Buster," for many of their human endurance tests. Other tests involve firing bullets, hard drive fragments or CD-ROM fragments into fake human torsos constructed of ballistic gelatin. So I had some familiarity with "cadaver stand-ins" in the testing of human limits.
But Mary Roach isn't interested in stand-ins. She goes straight for the real thing, the rogue scientists who use real dead people for experiments. It's a subject rarely spoken about, barely acknowledged by the body donation establishment. Not all cadavers end up in dissection labs for budding surgeons.
Roach's tone in the book, as other reviewers have noted, is irreverent without being disrespectful. The cavalier attitudes sometimes adopted by trauma nurses in order to deal with stress seem somehow inappropriate when dealing with the already-dead. Nothing can hurt a corpse further -- and yet there's a cultural, or perhaps evolutionary reluctance to desecrate the newly departed. The irony is not lost on Roach.
This is a fast and fascinating read, reminiscent perhaps of Perri Klass's work or her fellow Discover Magazine medical columnist, Jeffrey Kluger. Roach imparts quite a bit of science and research arcana by keeping it light and chatty, and I did not find her humor annoying or out of place. In fact, it's the perfect lubricant for making a difficult subject morbidly entertaining. |
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