Stiff: The Secret Lives of Human Cadavers

I thought this was fascinating. It's one of those real science books written for the lay person (such as myself). It's not a novel or exaggerated in any sense. While the topic of "human cadavers" is pretty depressing and dark, I thought the author did a really good job of just talking about what happens to a body, not the person and the person's soul, after they pass.

I always thought that when a person "donated" their body to science, it meant they they became organ donors. How wrong was I? Human cadavers get shot at, used as test dummies in car accidents (sometimes a dummy isn't good enough"), get decapitated and used to teach plastic surgeons how to perfect their craft. Some portions of human cadavers are melted down and used to pump into a mans genatalia (for a better sexual experience). The author even visits Dr. Arpad Vass who did an experiment with human cadavers by putting them out on a lawn and seeing the different rates of decomposition based on where they were sitting in the sun.

Not only does she talk about what's going on now, but she discusses what happened in the past and why grave diggers were so popular with doctors and scientists who paid them handsomely for getting them bodies of people who had just died.

I was shocked by this, but also so glad I read it because I now know how naive I was. Wow.