I strongly believe we need more books like this. Too often even the very idea of being prepared and actively researching death is met with confusion at best and aggression at worst, as if a person who is trying to learn more is nothing but a serial killer in the making. This seems highly unreasonable given that birth and death are pretty much the only two processes absolutely everyone is guaranteed to go through, and pretending no one needs to think about death unless they're already old and frail is no better than closing one's eyes and hoping this will make that person invisible.

There was much to enjoy here, but I found I couldn't connect with it. I'd read more from this author in the future though.

a thought provoking discussion of how our society (doesn't) deal with death correctly in acute hospitals. It's full of statistics relevant to Ireland but makes enough reference to the uK and USA to be applicable. No flow to the writing though

O'Mahoney intends to catalyse broader conversations about dying and death and his book offers a good jumping off point. His exploration of what he depicts as the taming of death via our own obsession with control and need to reduce 'unknowing' (my words) has resulted in our being unable to accept its essential grandeur and mystery.

He challenges assisted dying and our medicalised approaches to death and dying and it appears his underlying premise for this might be that dying can be unpredictable. This misses the point that a good advance plan, drawn up hand in hand with the person can account for this. Reactive management of dying is not inferior to proactive management in the face of unpredictability. He also fails to offer much in the way of solutions rooted in practicality. He ends by saying that he is no wiser but better-informed which is surely what decent patient-centred dying is about anyway?