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sometimesbryce 's review for:
From Here to Eternity: Traveling the World to Find the Good Death
by Caitlin Doughty
Caitlin Doughty's follow up to her hit Smoke Gets In Your Eyes features a well-designed jacket (David J. High) with a haunting skull illustration (Landis Blair) beneath a fairly misleading title. While trips are taken around the world, the majority of the book seems to focus on our own backyard. This isn't quite a letdown, as the States are more a hodgepodge of other lands than a land of their own making, but it still isn't quite accurate in its construction. Additionally, rather than finding the good death, Doughty uncovers the more profound (and obvious for those in the cultural field) many good deaths.
The rest, however, is as advertised, and I think the reason I didn't enjoy it as much, is because I failed to realize what I was getting into. As much as I think I'll always enjoy a travelogue, I just don't. I came for (and received brilliantly) cultural exploration and people practicing their most sacred and precious ceremonies. I just also got the travel information I can always do without. Death and dying fascinates me, and cultural studies will always be my first and greatest love, I just didn't realize it came in the same package as all the rest of it. Blair's inside illustrations, however, are stunning and haunting, and are worth the price of the book in and of themselves. Everything else is a bonus.
The rest, however, is as advertised, and I think the reason I didn't enjoy it as much, is because I failed to realize what I was getting into. As much as I think I'll always enjoy a travelogue, I just don't. I came for (and received brilliantly) cultural exploration and people practicing their most sacred and precious ceremonies. I just also got the travel information I can always do without. Death and dying fascinates me, and cultural studies will always be my first and greatest love, I just didn't realize it came in the same package as all the rest of it. Blair's inside illustrations, however, are stunning and haunting, and are worth the price of the book in and of themselves. Everything else is a bonus.