The Book of Resting Places: A Personal History of Where We Lay the Dead

by Thomas Mira y Lopez

In the aftermath of his father's untimely death and his family's 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 The Book of Resting Places, a singular collection of essays that weaves history, mythology, journalism, and personal narrative into the author's search for a place to process grief.
Across three continents and ten different resting places, Mira y Lopez explores unusual hallowed grounds. From the world's largest cryonics institute in southern Arizona, to a set of Roman catacombs being digested by modern bacteria, to his family's burial plots in the mountains outside Rio de Janeiro, to an 18th century desert cemetery that was relocated for the building of a modern courthouse, Mira y Lopez examines these overlooked spaces and what they tell us about ourselves and the passing of those we love--how we grieve them, and how we attempt to forget them. The Book of Resting Places's invigorating blend of ideas creates a relief map of our memorials while opening up the liminal spaces created not only when someone dies, but when our memories of them also begin to pass.
The Book of Resting Places is a roving elegy, a highly personal and startling dive into our personal and public underworlds--a meditation on the active and passive nature of memory, our variable states of grief, and our culture's inclination to turn a blind eye to what it cannot process.

Genres: Nonfiction, Death, History, Memoir, Grief, Essays

208 pages, Hardcover

Published November 14, 2017

Reviews

[MKF]

DNF

[Emily]

More personal than history, hit or miss with some chapters. I enjoyed the final chapter (Caudex, Codex?) and the chapter on cryonics!

[Dee Eisel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mira y Lopez's book reminds me of a lot of high lit books I read in college. I acknowledge that it's extremely well-written. It gets three stars just for that - it did keep me reading, no question. But I don't relate to the essayist at all. My experience of grief is completely different. The fourth star is for exposing me to a viewpoint I wouldn't have had before. But ultimately, I couldn't "get into" this book.

I understand some of the urge to hold on to things of the past, the way Mira y Lopez's mother does. I am a pack rat. But the writer just seems to be uncaring in a way I don't understand. He acts like he's superior to everyone around him, family or not. I expected this to be more about funerals and about grief. Instead, it's self-indulgent noodling.

There is one chapter that seems unlike any of the others: the chapter on cryonics and life suspension. It doesn't seem like it belongs in this book, and it's the only one that actually matches what I believed to be the topic of the book. Skip to it and read it - it's worth it!

This will appeal to a lot of folks. I'm not one.

[Kristin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating collection of essays. Before I picked this up, I went to a reading where he was one of the featured authors. From the reading, I expected this book to primarily autobiographical -- and it is -- but it also a lot of other things -- journalism, essay, analysis. The topics and tone varied quite a bit from essay to essay. Some of the essays were quite emotional while others were more factual. Some of the material here wasn't quite what I was expecting. For example, in one chapter he introduces us to his study abroad "father" and friend and then in another he investigates the merits of cryogenics. The author manages to step outside himself but still capture feelings of guilt and longing, especially in the more personal essays. I found this book a bit disjointed but evocative. The writing was fantastic, and the topics explored were extremely fascinating. I enjoyed this book and would definitely recommend it!

[Cat · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading this. I've always found it interesting how we inter our dead. Customs vary so much and are now changing here in the states. The book is a personal account of how the author dealt with the death of his father. Since we will all lose someone at some point in our lives, its a book worth reading.
I received a free e-book from the publisher in exchange for a fair review.

[Michelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lovely collection of elegiac essays that suffers from a ridiculously inaccurate blurb. This book has almost nothing to do with “the type and variety of places where we lay the dead to rest.” (In fact, when it does discuss burial practices some of the inaccuracies are alarming.) Instead, this collection explores metaphors for loss and place while exploring the question of memory and permanence.

[Al · Rating 5 out of 5]

Highly recommend. Arrestingly beautiful prose. The writing is mesmerizing. Full of light, intelligence, self-awareness, and existential mystery. Even with death as subject matter, it is playful and life affirming in its intimacy with the reader.

[Dana · Rating 3 out of 5]

I study cemeteries and death ritual.
This is not what I expected at all.
It's a strange, lyrical stream of consciousness about death and family and trees and memory.
It's lovely. Just not what I thought I was getting.

[Jonathan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book dazzling in its intellect and its emotion. A collection of essays that ponders death in both cultural and personal ways, blending the two even when they conflict. Amazing.

[Emily · Rating 1 out of 5]

I picked up this book because I heard an interview with the author, but what the author pitched this book as (research about burial practices across cultures with some allusion to his own experience with death) and what it actually is (memoir essays that happen to intersperse some information about burial practices) are very, very different.

I am really not a fan of memoirs. I think they’re too self-indulgent, and this collection is no different. Writing about death is hard, but this author wrote in a way that was aloof and distant, and felt like it was the way for him to keep his grief at bay. Or maybe he simply didn’t want to share those emotions with the public? (Why write this book then?)

Ultimately this book was not for me and I didn’t finish and only read about half the essays. It became clear I wasn’t going to like the later ones either, and I am finally giving myself permission to not read things I don’t actually love.

[Rachael · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed Lopez's personal revelations -- his relationship with his mother, his father's death, the conflicted feelings he had while in Italy when his father was ill. But we also get a fair bit of reportage, which I found to be weaker than the personal. The mix was a little jarring to me. Toward the end I struggled to pay attention. The chapter on cryonics was especially long and it took me a few different sittings to get through it. I thought the book had a promising start, but I think I missed the personal connection there at the end. The publisher writes that it's "...a highly personal and startling dive into our personal and public underworlds." I would not call it highly personal nor startling. Lopez is a lovely writer and there are many nice turns of the phrase and thoughtful meditations.

[Helen-Louise · Rating 3 out of 5]

I gave this book 3 stars, but am really not sure that that is fair. It is a strange book in many ways. Written as a series of essays, the tone varies significantly from one to another, I suppose varying with the author's mood as he traveled and wrote. He visits catacombs, cemeteries still in use and "defunct" cemeteries, churches, his mother's apartment. He talks to other people, especially his mother, and sometimes to his father. I find myself reading along and reading along - and suddenly I am done - have to put it down and go read something else before my head explodes. Am sure I will be thinking about it for months [years] after I finish it.

[Stephanie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wasn't too sure about this book but kept reading and once you get the knack of the style it gets better. It really does cover many different ways people deal with death/burial/memorial in its own odd way. Heads up for the occasional strong language (nothing someone unfamiliar with loss or even high school should be unfamiliar with but still a bit out of nowhere).

[Emily Duchon · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

[Michelle · Rating 2 out of 5]

I mean the writing is good but it didn't leave that much of an impression on me. It was just that...ok!

[L.C. Fiore · Rating 5 out of 5]

Clear and carefully considered prose. Not all about death, either. Although I have a feeling "The Eternal Comeback," about Lopez' exploration of cryogenics, is going to be the one that stays with me.

[Jill Nacnodovitz · Rating 1 out of 5]

Very misleading description on the back of the book... disappointing

[Theremin Poisoning · Rating 5 out of 5]

Profound, poetic meditations on loss, grief, and humans. Excellent.

[Lex · Rating 5 out of 5]

Captivating, concise writing. Mira y Lopez weaves a story with careful, thoughtful language and haunting undertones. I read this story months ago and still remember flashes of it on a daily basis. It's interesting and attention-grabbing from the first page, packed with intriguing anecdotes. Definitely worth reading.