Caring For The Dead: Your Final Act Of Love

CARING FOR THE DEAD: YOUR FINAL ACT OF LOVE

By Lisa Carlson; Upper Access, 1998; $29.95.

A how-to book on planning a funeral sounds pretty ghoulish--but that's exactly the point of Lisa Carlson's Caring for the Dead. Acting under the belief that everything will be taken care of by someone else is an invitation to the funeral industry to take advantage of you, says Carlson. Because caring for the dead is your final act of love for them, you should do whatever is possible to ensure that the funeral you have reflects your feelings rather than the funeral director's. Not all directors are crooks, admits Carlson, but the industry studies buying patterns and plays on people's vulnerabilities. Some mortuaries, for instance, display only money-making caskets and never mention the less expensive and perfectly good ones stored in the basement.

Part expose and part political action agenda, Caring for the Dead is a handbook for planning a funeral, with or without a director. Carlson is prone to distracting asides, but she presents helpful information on filling out a death certificate, cremation, state-by-state regulations, and inexpensive options like private burial in your own backyard that can circumvent some of the industry's myriad hidden costs. She urges all of us to talk about our wishes before we die so our families won't have to make important decisions at a time when they want to grieve.

COPYRIGHT 1999 Weider Publications
COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning