A review by hellabellaofficial
Smoke Gets in Your Eyes: And Other Lessons from the Crematory by Caitlin Doughty

5.0

This book reveals how death is not pretty. Nor should mourning be quiet. Bodies shouldn’t be shuffled away and hidden from families. Death should be fully acknowledged because if forces the living to face their own mortality in a way that might make them change the way they live their life. The book divulges how the funeral industry plays us all for suckers, something most of us already know. It also does a good job of showing us how to avoid that. Planning your death ahead of time is morbid, but it’s the best thing you can do if you want your family to focus on mourning instead of planning what outfit you’ll be wearing to your grave. Caitlin has an amazing writing voice that is dark, dorky, and truly sensitive of the needs of others. She tells personal stories of her life before being a mortician that help you understand why she would choose the field to work in. I have a deep respect for anyone working in the death industry. It is a job that faces you to see the worst parts of people in grave detail that stays in your mind and sometimes on your clothes long after you’ve gone home for the day.