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Loading... The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacksby Rebecca Skloot
  
» 31 more Books Read in 2015 (57) Top Five Books of 2013 (215) Books Read in 2014 (100) Top Five Books of 2015 (240) Top Five Books of 2016 (231) Swinging Seventies (16) Books read in 2015 (18) Carole's List (333) To Read - Medicine (10) al.vick-parents books (257) Penguin Random House (27) 1   greeniezona | Jan 24, 2019 |  This is the story of a woman named Henrietta Lacks. The world of science knows her only as HeLa. She was a poor tobacco farmer who died of a cancerous tumor in the 1950s. Before she died, doctors took a sample of her tumor into the labs at Johns Hopkins and for the first time ever, had cells that multiplied instead of perished. Her cells are used all over the world still today for vaccines, medicine, cloning, gene mapping, and more. There are billions of her cells all over the world that were sold for research, yet it was without Henrietta's knowledge or her families knowledge. This book was written to introduce the world to Henrietta and her family so that we could learn more about the person who changed the face of medicine. This was a fabulous book. My husband is a geneticist and went to Johns Hopkins medical school. There they used and learned about HeLa cells on a regular basis, but were never told of the woman behind the cells. The woman who wrote this book did years of research to track down the family, and the doctors and the researchers who were involved in the initial removal of Henrietta's tumor. Henrietta's family was very angry that this all happened and yet they could not even get health insurance. They never saw any money related to these cells, and felt that Henrietta was violated because they were taken without her knowledge. The author of the book spent years breaking into the family and getting them to talk to her, and getting them to trust her that she was trying to find out the truth about Henrietta and what happened with her cells. The author spends most of her time with Henrietta's daughter - taking her a long for many of her investigations so that she can discover things about her mother she never knew. The story was wonderful, and the author taking the time to find out about the person behind the cells was even more wonderful. I am so glad I got to read about it. I hope these days that the scientist are explaining where HeLa came from and the person she was. (  ) JenMat | Jan 10, 2019 | This truly was a fascinating book and my first question after finishing it was; Why did I not know about this? I was shocked that this was even allowed to happen. Even though the genre is non-fiction, we all agreed that it read like a book of fiction and had a lot of scientific details and data that quite frankly was over our heads, but it didn't take us away from the story. It was still engaging and extremely informative. The story takes place in the early '50s, at a time, if you were black, the medical treatment you received, (If any) was far poorer than if you were white. The industry was corrupt and dishonest and the book made us realize just how bad it was and even though it's still not perfect, we've come a long way. We all felt angered by the way Henrietta's family was treated and praised the author for such a thorough investigation and report of their story. She was honest and told it how it was. Raw and truthful. An unexpected incredible read. (  ) tinahogangrant | Dec 18, 2018 | This is a scientific, biographical book about a dead woman’s cells. It is important to note that this woman’s cells saved and is continuing to save millions of lives and that she is black woman (I hope Trump gets to benefit from her cells). As I said that it is scientific, full of science stuff but also full of emotion. I loved how it centered on Henrietta’s family especially Deborah. It gives you an idea on who Henrietta really is: she is not just a bunch of cells. She is someone’s mother, sister and wife. I’m recommending this to everybody! ( ) krizia_lazaro | Dec 13, 2018 | Just started -- pretty gripping so far. ( ) decaturmamaof2 | Nov 28, 2018 |
 Skloot narrates the science lucidly, tracks the racial politics of medicine thoughtfully and tells the Lacks family’s often painful history with grace. She also confronts the spookiness of the cells themselves, intrepidly crossing into the spiritual plane on which the family has come to understand their mother’s continued presence in the world. Science writing is often just about “the facts.” Skloot’s book, her first, is far deeper, braver and more wonderful. I put down Rebecca Skloot’s first book, “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” more than once. Ten times, probably. Once to poke the fire. Once to silence a pinging BlackBerry. And eight times to chase my wife and assorted visitors around the house, to tell them I was holding one of the most graceful and moving nonfiction books I’ve read in a very long time. Writing with a novelist's artistry, a biologist's expertise, and the zeal of an investigative reporter, Skloot tells a truly astonishing story of racism and poverty, science and conscience, spirituality and family, all driven by a galvanizing inquiry into the sanctity of the body and the very nature of the life force. Henrietta Lacks died of cervical cancer in a “colored” hospital ward in Baltimore in 1951. She would have gone forever unnoticed by the outside world if not for the dime-sized slice of her tumor sent to a lab for research eight months earlier. ... Skloot, a science writer, has been fascinated with Lacks since she first took a biology class at age 16. As she went on to earn a degree in the subject, she yearned to know more about the woman, anonymous for years, who was responsible for those ubiquitous cells.... Skloot tells a rich, resonant tale of modern science, the wonders it can perform and how easily it can exploit society's most vulnerable people. Has as a reference guide/companion
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A week or so later, he called me from Grandma's house. "Have you read the book yet?" he demanded. I took it off the shelf.
This book slayed me. From the aftermath of slavery/reconstruction/Jim Crow, to that idea common enough in mid-century that the doctor was the authority and it really wasn't that important if the patient understood their diagnosis or treatment, to the shame and silence that surrounded disease, especially cancer, and still much later -- mental illness, to the ways that black communities have been both intentionally and disinterestedly sidelined into inferior housing, jobs, services...
I could go on and on.
And on.
This book deserves all the hype, what Skloot went through to get this story -- what the family went through to share it! The bravery it must have taken to open up after being taken advantage of over and over again. And the totally amazing healing that sometimes snuck through.
Full of so many revelations that will make your jaw literally drop, then turn to find the next any person to share your amazement with.
Five-star non-fiction. (