Genuinely compelling for me, as I knew nothing at all about the “death” industry. This is the perfect framing to talk about taboo subjects embroiled in a myriad of (western) societal repressed topics. It’s companionable and earnest. Fantastic memoir structure too. The specific topics brought up align very well with the time cut out from her life being talked about, which is actually fairly rare for a memoir, imo. They tend to have two different timelines, reminiscence bouncing along the path as the overall story marches forward. While this is indicative of how memory works, it is often jarring.

The only knock against this is the humour. I am not a fan of it in 90% of everything I’ve ever read; it just does not land for me, and this is only augmented when a text is narrated. This could be a 5 star for me had it been actually funny or narrated by someone who can land jokes; either or, as I’m not sure which was the case for the humour not landing, for me. The authorial voice is just pretty heavy on it so it annoyed me often enough that it effected my overall enjoyment.