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I don't remember where I ran across this title, but it doesn't much matter. This is a memoir of a Jewish Cantor who becomes a Physician's Assistant (PA) and takes a job working for the City of New York doing body removals and autopsies in the 1990's through the early 2000's. He describes his very Orthodox upbringing and a bit of his family life while also escorting the reader through his decision to become a medicolegal investigator and the subsequent training that he endured. He has a wealth of stories, about Rabbinical autopsies (which I did not know existed), how to do a proper autopsy from start to finish (just in case you wanted to start doing them in your garage, you know), and the many and varied secrets that the dead carry with them. As someone who is always interested in true crimes, I found this to be incredibly fascinating stuff.

He also writes for just under half the book or so about the events of 09/11 at the World Trade Center, and his involvement with locating and identifying the dead. Here are even more tidbits of information than you would have ever thought of....such as the body parts with an identification on them that didn't match the owner of the body part, or the task of how to categorize all of the body parts and how to match them up with their grieving family members. Here, too, he addresses what happened to the terrorists at the World Trade Center, after the crash. This book is a wealth of information for the true crime aficionado as well as anyone who might have an interest in autopsies and the funeral industry. There are some re-created violent scenes and of course blood and guts. I really enjoyed reading this.
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Just wasn’t for me.