'Since I was a child, I've been interested in dead bodies. When I was eight years old, I dug up the remains of my pet budgie Zazbut. He had been buried for about eight weeks in a patch of grass outside our house in Dasmarinas, a fortified village in Manila, in the Philippines. 'The first exhumation was the beginning of my intrigue with death, which has persisted. As a journalist, I've written about graveyards, funerals and death doulas. I always visit the local cemetery wherever I am in the world. But one thing that has largely been hidden from me in this death trip is the dead body.' Dissection might not be a normal topic to contemplate but when both your paternal grandparents donate their bodies to science it does intermittently cross your mind. This is the story of how Jackie Dent's grandparents-Ruby and Julie-gave their bodies to science when they died. No one in her family seems to know why, or what really happened with their bodies afterwards. Were they avid science buffs? Was it to save on cremation costs? How do scientists tackle the practicalities and ethics of cutting up the dead for research? And who are body donors generally? Weaving the personal with the history of anatomy and the dissected, Jackie Dent explores the world of whole-body donation - all the while looking for answers as to what happened to her grandparents.

A haunting triple murder... the inside story of the investigation. When two worlds collide-the illegal transportation of tons of Mexican cartel marijuana to inner city gang members in a Midwestern city's "hood"-three bodies end up burning, caught in a web of greed as a major international drug deal goes very bad. The chilling trail of evidence from a remote wooded area where three bodies are set on fire leads homicide detectives across the country chasing down witnesses and conspirators in a two-year search for cold-blooded killers. This case has it all: murder, piles of cash stashed in the most unlikely of places, a blood-soaked crime scene, the remote dump site for bodies, luxury cars, flashy jewelry, and hundreds of pounds of illegal dope. An unbelievable break takes detectives down the rabbit hole where CSI meets Law & Order and where good old gumshoeing and meticulous forensic procedures bring down a mega-million-dollar drug conspiracy and lock up the bad guys for life. Follow the case through the eyes of the gritty homicide/narcotics detective. A handbook for the amateur criminologist, this book is for true crime fans, prosecutors and defense attorneys, and cops and robbers. Warning: This book contains graphic crime scene photos and adult language.

Ellen Phipps was married to a sociopathic lawyer. When the police wanted to interview him about a murder Ellen was terrified. This memoir describes how she kept herself and her daughter, Anne, safe from her increasingly unstable husband. The South African laws on marriage prevented Ellen from extricating herself and Anne safely without his permission. Yet Ellen managed to live an unusual and full life which is shown in actual excerpts culled from some documents. By sharing her story we are shown ways of ensuring that each trap set is avoided.