Death Books - Page 3

Night Falls Fast: Understanding Suicide

Kay Redfield Jamison

List Price: $26.00 By: Diane Pub Co Amazon Marketplace: 1 new & used starting at $93.51

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 74 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

From the best-selling author of An Unquiet Mind: the first major book in a quarter century on suicide, with a particular focus on its terrible pull on the young. Night Falls Fast is both compelling and timely: in the United States and across the world there has been a frightening surge in suicides committed by children, adolescents and young adults.  It is the third major cause of death in 19- to 24-year-olds, and the second in college students. Dr. Kay Redfield Jamison, an internationally recognized authority on depressive illnesses and their treatment, knows this subject firsthand.  At the age of 28, after years of struggling with manic-depression, she attempted to kill herself. Her survival marked the beginning of a life's work to investigate both mental illness and self-inflicted death.
        
Weaving together a psychological and scientific exploration of the subject with personal essays about individual suicides, Dr. Jamison in this book brings not only her compassion and literary skill, but all of her knowledge, research and clinical experience to bear on this devastating problem. In tracing the network of reasons that underlie suicide, Dr. Jamison gives us astonishing examples of the methods and places people have chosen to kill themselves, and a startling look at their journals, drawings and farewell notes. She also brings us vivid insight into the most recent findings from hospitals and laboratories across the world; the critical biological and psychological factors that interact to cause suicide; the new strategies being evolved to combat them; and the powerful, but insufficiently used treatments from modern medicine.

Night Falls Fast dispels the silence and shame that too often surround suicide; it helps us to understand the suicidal mind, to better recognize the person at risk, and to comprehend the profound and disturbing loss created in those left behind.

Being with Dying: Cultivating Compassion and Fearlessness in the Presence of Death

Joan Halifax

Amazon Price: $15.61 List Price: $22.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Shambhala Amazon Marketplace: 46 new & used starting at $14.09

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 3 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Straight from and to the heart 5 out of 5 stars.
5 of 5 people found this review helpful.

Healthy, clear, concise guidance, including reflective meditation to care for those who are dying.

At the same time in developing compassion and fearlessness to face the dying, it concurrently provides a guide for healthy living.

Who knows what is most important in life? Those who deny it and live on in ignorant bliss, or those for whom it is already knocking on their door.

Editorial Review:

In this long-awaited book of inspiring and practical teachings, Buddhist teacher Joan Halifax offeres the fruits of her many years of work with dying people. Inspired by traditional Buddhist teachings, her work is a source of wisdom for all those who are charged with a dying person's care, facing their own death, or wishing to explore and contemplate the transformative power of the dying process.

Halifax offers lessons from dying people and caregivers, as well as guided meditations to help readers contemplate death without fear, develop a commitment to helping others, and transform suffering and resistance into courage. She says, "Why wait until we are actualy dying to explore what it may mean to die with awareness?"

A world-renowned pioneer in care of the dying, Joan Halifax founded the Project on Being with Dying, which helps dying people to face death with courage and trains professional and family caregivers in compassionate and ethical end-of-life care.

Lament for a Son

Nicholas P. Wolterstoff

By: SPCK Publishing Amazon Marketplace: 5 new & used starting at $20.78

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 22 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Wonderfu resource for those in pain 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

This book was recommended to me by a wonderful lady by the name of Mary who owns a bookstore in Sandwich, MA on the Cape. I was curious as to how it would fare due to how thin it was but I began reading it immediately. I could NOT put it down. I read it in one sitting as it's very easy to read due to it's journal style. Nicholas Wolterstorff is a master at writing about all the feelings one goes through after a loss. Feelings that leave you scratching your head and wondering how you arrived at them and yet mange to still function as part of society. Feelings that leave you numb and wounded from the heavy burden and pain. Feelings that if you wanted to capture you would struggle to form concise sentences from the sheer overwhelming nature of them. Nicholas manages all of the above and more. He will touch you with his heart-wrenching understanding of grief. I cried, I nodded my head, I marveled at just how much my pain was not only recognized but acknowledged and validated. My pain is still with me, you will never be rid of it nor should you want to be (a notion mentioned in the book) but I have a feeling of peace more so than before I read it. This peace I think comes from not being alone in my pain. And while I wouldn't wish the loss of a child on anyone, I'm so blessed to have had the chance to read Lament for a Son because it has allowed me to feel part of a community of mourners. A community where I am allowed to suffer and grieve, but also clearly be aware of why I suffer and that is because I LOVE. Sadly in the real world we are made to feel we must 'get over' our loss and as a result are outcast in society. Through his words Nicholas Wolterstorff shows just how much of a force death and grief affect the loved ones left on earth. This book is a gift for those in pain from loss and is also a gift for those who want to help family or friends but don't know what to say. My son was stillborn and while this loss is diffeent from losing a 25 year old child, it is still a loss that has forever changed me. Lament for a Son has helped me in my grief, and I hope it helps your pain too.

The Undertaking

Thomas Lynch

By: Jonathan Cape Amazon Marketplace: 11 new & used starting at $3.99

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 55 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

A poet and an undertaker 4 out of 5 stars.
3 of 3 people found this review helpful.

This is a charming book, one that feeds my own desire and interest in writing because Lynch is, first of all, a humanitarian, and a poet who closely observes life--and death--around him. And he doesn't pull his punches when he talks about the world he sees evolving around him--again, often through the lens of death and dying. But it's not a morbid book. Rather it's a book that will make you want to live the best life you can in the time you have allotted to you--that all the "little things" are what matter.

A Poet's View of the "Dismal Trade" 5 out of 5 stars.
3 of 3 people found this review helpful.

This is a fantastic book. If you can swallow the subject matter, everything about the funeral business, then it is a beautifully written collection of essays about life. Lynch is first and foremost a poet, so his lyrical use of language is extraordinary. The book is a collection of essays. I believe the first essay was originally published alone, and then the rest of the essays were compiled into a book format. All of the essays (chapters) are well-written and insightful. This is a book that I sent to my pickiest-reader friend, who loved it. Don't let the subject matter dissuade you from reading this unusual book.

Editorial Review:

The American poet, Thomas Lynch, is also a funeral director in a small Michigan town, and this is his testimony. It comprises 12 essays - each a lesson taught to the living by the dead.

Life Lessons: Two Experts on Death and Dying Teach Us About the Mysteries of Life and Living

Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, David Kessler

Amazon Price: $11.20 List Price: $14.00 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Scribner Amazon Marketplace: 86 new & used starting at $1.40

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 48 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

This book will help you get out of the "hallways" of life 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

The quote from the book that stuck with me was from Ronnie Kaye author of Spinning Straw Into Gold. "In life when one door closes another door always opens, but the hallways are a bitch."

I read this book three years ago after my sister passed from cancer and really learned a lot from it. If you have had someone close to you die or know someone that has had the unpleasant experience of having to battle for their life every day, this book may be of some help to you in learning "how" to interact with them. Learning to cope with a disease is never easy for the patient or the family and friends. This book is a good attempt to help each of us do just that.

I recently picked the book up again after experiencing a missed opportunity that cost me five months salary. This book brought closure to the experience. The wisdom from this book has reinforced my decision not to seek a legal remedy through the court system as a solution to my difference of opinion with my former employer. It made me realize that in life, the reality is that some relationships just don't work out. It has saved me time, money and energy that otherwise may have been wasted. After finishing the book a second time, I walk away feeling like I have been given a gift. I have been given a second opportunity to change my life and move on.

Editorial Review:

Is this really how I want to live my life?

Each one of us at some point asks this question. The tragedy is not that life is short but that we often see only in hindsight what really matters.

In this, her first book on life and living, Elisabeth Kubler-Ross joins with David Kessler to guide us through the practical and spiritual lessons we need to learn so that we can live life to its fullest in every moment. Many years of working with the dying have shown the authors that certain lessons come up over and over again. Some of these lessons are enormously difficult to master, but even the attempts to understand them can be deeply rewarding. Here, in fourteen accessible chapters, from the Lesson of Love to the Lesson of Happiness, the authors reveal the truth about our fears, our hopes, our relationships, and, above all, about the grandness of who we really are.

Final Exits: The Illustrated Encyclopedia of How We Die

Michael Largo

Amazon Price: $10.85 List Price: $15.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Harper Paperbacks Amazon Marketplace: 57 new & used starting at $4.99

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 14 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

To die, kick the bucket, to meet your Maker, dead as a doornail, get whacked, smoked, bite the dust, sleep with the fishes, go six feet under—whatever death is called, it's going to happen. In 1789 Ben Franklin wrote, "In this world nothing is certain but death and taxes." Death remains a certainty. But how do we die? It's the enormous variety of how that enlivens final exits.

According to death certificates, in 1700 there were less than 100 causes of death. Today there are 3,000. With each advance of technology, people find new ways to become deceased, often causing trends that peak in the first year. People are now killed by everything, from cell phones, washing machines, lawn mowers and toothpicks, to the boundless catalog of man—made medicines. In Final Exits the causes of death—bizarre or common—are alphabetically arranged and include actual accounts of people, both famous and ordinary, who unfortunately died that way. (Ants, bad words, Bingo, bean bag chairs, flying cows, frozen toilets, hiccups, lipstick, moray eels, road kill, starfish, and toupees are only some of the more unusual causes.)

The Economist Book of Obituaries

Keith Colqhoun, Ann Wroe

Amazon Price: $19.77 List Price: $29.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Bloomberg Press Amazon Marketplace: 12 new & used starting at $18.00

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 1 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

people were dying to be included... 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

As a big fan of well-written obituaries (like those in the New York Times) I am always looking for more pungently penned death notices.

This collection of obits from the Economist was right up my alley. They never published obits prior to 1995 so they are making up for lost time. They only publish one per week so they are ultra-selective. There are plenty of famous deaths marked in this book. I prefer those that honor people we might have never heard of, like Jean Baudrillard the philosopher of consumerism, Christopher Cockerell, the inventor of the hovercraft, and Rene' Thom the inventor of catastrophe theory.

One particular favorite is for "Bip." Do you remember Bip? Read this fine collection and you'll remember him.. Psst...if you know who Bip was please say nothing about it....

Editorial Review:

For more than a decade, The Economist has included unique and original obituaries in a quite popular column. The obituaries are remarkable because of the unpredictable selection of people written about, the surprising lives they led, and the brilliant writing style. This volume gathers two hundred of the best obituaries. The selection for this book ranges far and wide: Syd Barret of Pink Floyd to John Kenneth Galbraith; Pope Jean Paul II to Sony founder Akio Morita; Este Lauder to Hunter S. Thompson; and Marcel Marceau to even Alex the African Grey (sciences best-known parrot). The book includes illustrations and photographs.

What Happens When We Die?: A Groundbreaking Study into the Nature of Life and Death

Sam Parnia

Amazon Price: $13.45 List Price: $14.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Hay House Amazon Marketplace: 22 new & used starting at $7.58

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 13 Average rating: 2.5 of 5

Death Is A Pleasant Experience 4 out of 5 stars.
19 of 21 people found this review helpful.

Have you ever wondered what it is like to die? Have you ever wondered about "near death experiences" or "out of body experiences"? Then this is book is for you.

Sam Parnia, MD, PhD in "What Happens When We Die" covers the history of near-death experiences (NDEs), the results of studies to date on NDEs, conventional and non-conventional theories on what causes NDEs, and implications for future research of NDEs, including his own on-going scientific study.

Near-death experiences are characterized by:
1. An experience of peace, well-being, and an absence of pain.
2. A sense of detachment from the physical body, progressing to and out-of-body experience.
3. Entering darkness, a tunnel experience with panoramic memory, and a predominately positive effect.
4. An experience of light that is bright, warm, and attractive
5. Entering the light; meeting persons or figures

At present, NDEs, and whether they are real of not, depends on the social group that is asked. If we question those people who have had an NDE, they mostly believe that it is real experience, whereas if a group of skeptics is asked, they will say they are not. We do know that a near-death experience has a profoundly religious impact on those who experience it, and many of them perform altruistic acts afterward.

Parnia concludes that at the very least, the dying process is a pleasant experience for the majority. He also concludes that the mind and consciousness may exist separately from the brain and also, during, and at least for some time, after death. This connection or lack thereof has significant implications for ethics, theology, and philosophy.

My father had a NDE several years before he died. I have had a deep interest in this subject ever since. "What Happens When We Die" integrates medicine, science, and first person stories to provide the best overview of the subject to date.

Editorial Review:

Dr. Sam Parnia faces death every day. Through his work as a critical-care doctor in a hospital emergency room, he became very interested in some of his patients’ accounts of the experiences that they had while clinically dead. He started to collect these stories and read all the latest research on the subject, and then he decided to conduct his own experiments. That work has culminated in this extraordinary book, which picks up where Raymond Moody’s Life After Life left off.

           

Written in a scientific, balanced, and engaging style, this is powerful and compelling reading.

This fascinating and controversial book will change the way you look at death and dying. . . .

Grief Counseling and Grief Therapy: A Handbook for the Mental Health Practitioner, Fourth Edition

J. William Worden

Amazon Price: $36.00 List Price: $45.00 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Springer Publishing Company Amazon Marketplace: 29 new & used starting at $36.00

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Total reviews: 1 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Dr. Worden presents the highly anticipated fourth edition to Grief Counseling and Grief Therapy, the gold standard of grief therapy handbooks. The previous editions received worldwide acclaim for their sensitive, insightful, and practical approach to grief counseling. In this updated and revised fourth edition, Dr. Worden presents his most recent thinking on bereavement drawn from extensive research, clinical work, and the best of the new literature.

Key Features:

• New chapter, The Mourning Process: Mediators of Mourning, includes discussion on the personal and social variables that shape individual mourning processes
• Detailed guidelines and models for approaching special types of mourning, including suicide, sudden death, and miscarriage
• A new version of the "Task Model" to help the bereaved accomplish their "tasks of mourning"
• Guidelines to help therapists understand and work through their own experiences of grief

Comprehensive and highly organized, this text is useful to therapists just beginning to work in the field as well as seasoned practitioners

The American Resting Place: 400 Years of History Through Our Cemeteries and Burial Grounds

Marilyn Yalom

Amazon Price: $19.80 List Price: $30.00 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Houghton Mifflin Amazon Marketplace: 47 new & used starting at $14.80

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Total reviews: 12 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

A sweeping history of America as seen through its gravestones, graveyards, and burial practices, stunningly illustrated with eighty black-and-white photographs

Cemeteries and burial grounds, as illuminated by an acclaimed cultural historian, are unique windows onto our religious, ethnic, and deeply human history as Americans.

The dedicated mother-son team of Marilyn and Reid Yalom visited hundreds of cemeteries to create The American Resting Place, following a coast-to-coast trajectory that mirrors the vast historical pattern of American migration.

Yalom's incisive, often poignant exploration of gravestone inscriptions reveal changing ideas about death and personal identity, and demonstrate how class and gender play out in stone. Rich particulars include the story of one seventeenth-century Bostonian who amassed a thousand pairs of gloves in his funeral-going lifetime, the unique burial rites and funerary symbols found in today's Native American cultures, and a "lost" Czech community brought uncannily to life in Chicago's Bohemian National Columbarium.

From fascinating past to startling future--DVDs embedded in tombstones, "green" burials, and "the new aesthetic of death"--The American Resting Place is the definitive history of the American cemetery.