Past Mortems

Past Mortems by Carla Valentine. paperback edition. ISBN: 9780751565324.

A day in the life of Carla Valentine - curator, pathology technician and death professional - is not your average day. She spent ten years training and working as an Anatomical Pathology Technologist: where the mortuary slab was her desk, and that days corpses her task list. Past Mortems tells Carlas stories of those years, as well as investigating the body alongside our attitudes towards death - shedding light on what the living can learn from dead and the toll the work can take on the living souls who carry it out. Fascinating and insightful, Past Mortems reveals the truth about what happens when the mortuary doors swing shut or the lid of the coffin closes . . .