Staff Review: Smoke Gets in Your Eyes & Other Lessons from the Crematory by Caitlin Doughty

I was browsing YouTube a few weeks ago, as one does, and I stumbled upon a channel called Ask a Mortician. There were video titles like "American Mummies" and "ICONIC CORPSE: The Preservation of Eva Peron." I fell down the rabbit hole of videos, hosted by a woman who looks like someone I would be friends with. Caitlin Doughty, with her Bettie Page bangs and bold lipstick, doesn't look like the stereotypical mortician. However, she is the face of the alternative death industry. Her memoir, Smoke Gets in Your Eyes & Other Lessons from the Crematory, reveals how she got started in the industry and what she learned along the way.

This was a fascinating read. I definitely learned a lot about the death industry, and it made me confront my own mortality in a good way. This book and Caitlin's YouTube channel challenge you to think about your own after-death wishes and tell you about more than the American standard of embalming and being buried in a box. I recommend this to anyone who is interested in death or the death industry, anyone who watched Six Feet Under, and anyone who likes witty creative non-fiction essays. Fans of Mary Roach will particularly enjoy this.

Be sure to check out Ask a Mortician and Caitlin's website. Her new book, From Here to Eternity, was just released and I can't wait to read more.

-Libby, Youth Services