Stiff

In Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers, Mary Roach tells you everything you ever wanted to know about dead bodies. She provides an eyewitness account of places that few visit, observing what people do to cadavers and how they cope with the reality of dealing with corpses.

She starts with an eerie scene in which a roomful of plastic surgeons practice their craft on decapitated heads sitting in pots. She goes on to describe the sordid practice of body snatching for dissection, which was common in past centuries when people were horrified at the prospect of their bodies being desecrated. Researchers watch how bodies decay to gain raw data for forensics. Experiments with human crash test dummies improve automobile safety. Organs are harvested from bodies that are brain-dead, but still have a beating heart. Finally, Roach examines exotic topics like crucifixion studies, head transplants, cannibalism, and using human bodies as compost.

While I was aware of most of the topics Roach covers, it’s interesting to read a first-hand account of what happens in, say, a med school anatomy lab. Roach finds a reasonable way to balance respect for the dead, the grisliness of corpses, and natural curiosity about a taboo topic. Stiff is a quick read, and it isn’t as unsettling as I had feared. Some parts were better than others, but overall I’d recommend the book to anyone who doesn't get queasy too easily.