The book of resting places: a personal history of where we lay the dead

In the aftermath of his fathers untimely death and his familys indecision over what to do with the remains, Thomas Mira y Lopez became obsessed with the type and variety of places where we lay the dead to rest. The result is a singular collection of essays that weaves together history, mythology, journalism, and personal narrative into the authors search for a place to process grief. Mira y Lopez explores unusual hallowed groundsfrom the worlds largest cryonics institute in southern Arizona to a set of Roman catacombs being digested by modern bacteria, to his familys burial plots in the mountains outside Rio de Janeiro to a nineteenth-century desert cemetery that was relocated for the building of a modern courthouse. The Book of Resting Places examines these overlooked spaces and what they tell us about ourselves and the passing of those we lovehow we grieve them, and how we attempt to forget them.