All of us

the long version

Tell me how you die and I will tell you who you are. It's an ancient adage, oft-repeated and profoundly true. When we talk about death, we are talking about a great many other things - our longings, our fears, our sense of identity, perhaps even what we want from life. In Patricia Anderson's illuminating collection of interviews, she examines this universal subject with insight, tenderness, even humor. Here are over sixty American voicesfrom gang kids to filmmakers, Native American shamans to robotics engineers expressing their beliefs about our only true common bond. Some are people in the public eye, like author Isabel Allende, performance artist Laurie Anderson, and physician Andrew Weil. Others are more private citizens. But all of them eloquently reveal a rich variety of experiences, feelings, and beliefs about death.