The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks in Crazy Challenge Connection

Feb 19, 2012 Book Concierge rated it it was amazing

Shelves: medicine, concierge, library, nonfiction, sfe, virginia

In 1951 Henrietta Lacks died of an aggressive form of cervical cancer, but her cells live on. For the first time, scientists were able to successfully culture living cells from a tissue sample; a tiny sliver of tissue from the cancer that killed Henrietta became the world-known HeLa cells, used in countless research projects. Yet the donor of this remarkable gift to science was never acknowledged, and, in fact, her family was unaware of her contribution for decades. This is the story not only of ...more

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Nov 08, 2010 Marla rated it liked it

Shelves: non-fiction, book-club, with-reservations, adult, zz-2011, book-discussion

3.5 stars. Well written and interesting. I am just not a huge fan of non-fiction books.

Likes:
* Written like a story and not a typical non-fiction book based on scientific material
* Alternates between the story of Henrietta Lacks life and her cells and the author's tale of researching the book
* Learning about the back story of Henrietta Lacks and her family
* Impressed at how patient the author was with the Lacks family, especially Deborah
(view spoiler) ...more

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Oct 07, 2011 Stacy rated it really liked it

Shelves: read-in-2011, nonfiction, books-to-movies, book-club-reads

This was an interesting, yet horrifying book.

I feel like the book was more about Henrietta's family than Henrietta. I would have liked to have learned more about Henrietta.

However, her family is what makes Henrietta immortal, even more than her cells.

I thought the science was interesting, yet for all of the good things scientists work on, there is so much room for malfeasance with human tissues.

I'm also not sure if I liked the organization of the book, alternating between the science and the fam ...more

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Nov 04, 2010 Tien rated it really liked it

Shelves: non-fiction, amazon-best-2010-ed

My 2 main thoughts for this book are "sad" and "thought-provoking".

SAD because what's happened to Henrietta Lacks and her children. I'm talking about the social effects of being treated differently as "coloured people" from back way when. Being of ethnic origin, I can attest to the Un-pleasantness of being treated as different (though I am lucky being different today is NOT as it was back then).

THOUGHT-PROVOKING for the book touches of 'gray areas' concerns. Is there any limit of scientific rese ...more

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Aug 27, 2010 Chris rated it really liked it

Shelves: audiobook, nonfiction

Rebecca Skloot has written an incredible, well-researched and very readable non-fiction book. She weaves together three stories: the life of Henrietta, whose cancer cells have helped medical research in more ways than it may be possible to count and yet who most people never heard of; the devastating impact of Henrietta's death and the very belated discovery of what happened to her cells on her family, with a strong subtext of the lasting effects of racism; and the immortal cells themselves, st ...more

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