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A review by burdasnest
All the Living and the Dead by Hayley Campbell
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
slow-paced
3.5
I was really hoping this book would be a good companion to Stiff by Mary Roach, but the only similarity was the journalistic approach. It was certainly informative, but the author interjected her own experiences and opinions amidst the information more than I would have personally preferred. To me, that just padded the book, and I would have preferred it to be more informative and shorter in that case. The point that we owe gratitude and grace to the unseen death workers is well taken, but I could have been spared the philosophy of the author on how she processes death. It is not humorous, and it's certainly not for anyone squeamish. But at the same time, the author manages to make gore and guts boring.
Graphic: Body horror, Cancer, Death, Gore, Terminal illness, Blood, Excrement, Medical content, Grief, and Death of parent
Minor: Child death, Chronic illness, Genocide, Gun violence, Self harm, Suicide, Mass/school shootings, Car accident, Suicide attempt, and Fire/Fire injury