The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
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"'One of the most graceful and moving non-fiction books I've read in a very long time' Dwight Garner, New York Times 'Skloot's book is wonderful - deeply felt, gracefully written, sharply reported. It is a story about science but, much more, about life.' Susan Orlean, author of The Orchid Thief"
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. She was a poor Southern tobacco farmer who worked the same land as her slave ancestors, yet her cells—taken without her knowledge—became one of the most important tools in medicine. The first “immortal” human cells grown in culture, they are still alive today, though she has been dead for more than sixty years. If you could pile all HeLa cells ever grown onto a scale, they’d weigh more than 50 million metric tons—as much as a hundred Empire State Buildings. HeLa cells were vital for developing the polio vaccine; uncovered secrets of cancer, viruses, and the atom bomb’s effects; helped lead to important advances like in vitro fertilization, cloning, and gene mapping; and have been bought and sold by the billions.
Yet Henrietta Lacks remains virtually unknown, buried in an unmarked grave.
Now Rebecca Skloot takes us on an extraordinary journey, from the “colored” ward of Johns Hopkins Hospital in the 1950s to stark white laboratories with freezers full of HeLa cells; from Henrietta’s small, dying hometown of Clover, Virginia—a land of wooden slave quarters, faith healings, and voodoo—to East Baltimore today, where her children and grandchildren live and struggle with the legacy of her cells.
Henrietta’s family did not learn of her “immortality” until more than twenty years after her death, when scientists investigating HeLa began using her husband and children in research without informed consent. And though the cells had launched a multimillion-dollar industry that sells human biological materials, her family never saw any of the profits. As Rebecca Skloot so brilliantly shows, the story of the Lacks family—past and present—is inextricably connected to the dark history of experimentation on African Americans, the birth of bioethics, and the legal battles over whether we control the stuff we are made of.
Over the decade it took to uncover this story, Rebecca became enmeshed in the lives of the Lacks family—especially Henrietta’s daughter Deborah, who was devastated to learn about her mother’s cells. She was consumed with questions: Had scientists cloned her mother? Did it hurt her when researchers infected her cells with viruses and shot them into space? What happened to her sister, Elsie, who died in a mental institution at the age of fifteen? And if her mother was so important to medicine, why couldn’t her children afford health insurance?
Intimate in feeling, astonishing in scope, and impossible to put down, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks captures the beauty and drama of scientific discovery, as well as its human consequences.
Yet Henrietta Lacks remains virtually unknown, buried in an unmarked grave.
Now Rebecca Skloot takes us on an extraordinary journey, from the “colored” ward of Johns Hopkins Hospital in the 1950s to stark white laboratories with freezers full of HeLa cells; from Henrietta’s small, dying hometown of Clover, Virginia—a land of wooden slave quarters, faith healings, and voodoo—to East Baltimore today, where her children and grandchildren live and struggle with the legacy of her cells.
Henrietta’s family did not learn of her “immortality” until more than twenty years after her death, when scientists investigating HeLa began using her husband and children in research without informed consent. And though the cells had launched a multimillion-dollar industry that sells human biological materials, her family never saw any of the profits. As Rebecca Skloot so brilliantly shows, the story of the Lacks family—past and present—is inextricably connected to the dark history of experimentation on African Americans, the birth of bioethics, and the legal battles over whether we control the stuff we are made of.
Over the decade it took to uncover this story, Rebecca became enmeshed in the lives of the Lacks family—especially Henrietta’s daughter Deborah, who was devastated to learn about her mother’s cells. She was consumed with questions: Had scientists cloned her mother? Did it hurt her when researchers infected her cells with viruses and shot them into space? What happened to her sister, Elsie, who died in a mental institution at the age of fifteen? And if her mother was so important to medicine, why couldn’t her children afford health insurance?
Intimate in feeling, astonishing in scope, and impossible to put down, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks captures the beauty and drama of scientific discovery, as well as its human consequences.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
113 of 117 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review
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In 1951 human tissue culture was in its infancy, with researchers struggling to keep cells alive beyond a few cellular generations; normal cells are subject to apoptosis (programmed cellular lifespan/death)
Henrietta Lacks, a poor young black woman, was admitted to hospital in Baltimore in 1951 with an exceptionally invasive and aggressive cancer.
A standard biopsy was taken of her cancerous cells. She did not know that the biopsy would not be used purely for diagnostic purposes, but also tissues would be used for research. No consent was sought for this. In 1951 and indeed still today samples of tissue taken for diagnostic purposes can be used for other purposes - we do not own our tissues once they are no longer part of us.
Cancer cells are not subject to apoptosis. The particular aggressiveness of Henrietta Lack's cancer yielded astonishing results for tissue culture, and within a short space of time the `HeLa' cell line was being used for a wide number of medical research studies world wide, whether testing the actions of many pharmaceutical drugs or as part of the human genome project, and more.
`HeLa' has had profound, beneficial effects on probably most of us who benefit from modern medicine. HeLa has earned millions of dollars and much prestige for many predominantly white male scientists, as patents have been taken out on advances only possible through tissue culture using the HeLa line
However, Henrietta's family were unaware of the rich legacy she left the world - or the rich financial legacy reaped by institutions and individuals. In fact, they remained poor and unable to afford healthcare.
Rebecca Skloot has written an angering, compassionate and educative book, looking not only at the science made possible by HeLa - but also exposing the arrogance, hypocrisy and callousness of some individuals and establishments within scientific research. She also tells the story of Henrietta and the Lacks family - indeed, formed strong relationships with that family. Inevitably, given time and place the book is also a shameful expose of how America used its poor in unethical `research' very little different from the `research' which Mengele and others were using in concentration camps a decade or so earlier
This book pulls no punches, and may not be for those sensitive to medical issues - there are graphic descriptions of medical procedures and the ravages of terminal illness. It is, however, extraordinary.
Henrietta Lacks, a poor young black woman, was admitted to hospital in Baltimore in 1951 with an exceptionally invasive and aggressive cancer.
A standard biopsy was taken of her cancerous cells. She did not know that the biopsy would not be used purely for diagnostic purposes, but also tissues would be used for research. No consent was sought for this. In 1951 and indeed still today samples of tissue taken for diagnostic purposes can be used for other purposes - we do not own our tissues once they are no longer part of us.
Cancer cells are not subject to apoptosis. The particular aggressiveness of Henrietta Lack's cancer yielded astonishing results for tissue culture, and within a short space of time the `HeLa' cell line was being used for a wide number of medical research studies world wide, whether testing the actions of many pharmaceutical drugs or as part of the human genome project, and more.
`HeLa' has had profound, beneficial effects on probably most of us who benefit from modern medicine. HeLa has earned millions of dollars and much prestige for many predominantly white male scientists, as patents have been taken out on advances only possible through tissue culture using the HeLa line
However, Henrietta's family were unaware of the rich legacy she left the world - or the rich financial legacy reaped by institutions and individuals. In fact, they remained poor and unable to afford healthcare.
Rebecca Skloot has written an angering, compassionate and educative book, looking not only at the science made possible by HeLa - but also exposing the arrogance, hypocrisy and callousness of some individuals and establishments within scientific research. She also tells the story of Henrietta and the Lacks family - indeed, formed strong relationships with that family. Inevitably, given time and place the book is also a shameful expose of how America used its poor in unethical `research' very little different from the `research' which Mengele and others were using in concentration camps a decade or so earlier
This book pulls no punches, and may not be for those sensitive to medical issues - there are graphic descriptions of medical procedures and the ravages of terminal illness. It is, however, extraordinary.
90 of 95 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This is without question the best non-fiction book I've read in years. Skloot's debut is thrilling, original and refuses to be shoehorned into anything as trivial as a genre. Equal parts popular science, historical biography and detective novel, it reads as evocatively as any work of fiction.
Skloot repeatedly appears as a character in her own book, narrating her journey from first hearing about HeLa cells in a classroom to her attempts to contact and support the Lacks family. Her narration reveals the trials that the Lacks family have undergone since Henrietta's cells went global, and the sheer amount of trust it took to uncover the details of this story.
But this is really a book about three heroines - the two whose names grace the cover and Henrietta's daughter, Deborah Lacks. Skloot's personal mission to tell this story and Deborah's quest to know about her mother's life and legacy are central parts of Henrietta's story and they form some of the book's most compelling segments.
I write this review as someone who isn't typically a fan of historical non-fiction. Particularly in popular science, I often find descriptions of researchers to be distracting attempts at shoehorning in a human element that is out of keeping with the rest of the book. Not so here - this work has the most human of stories at its core, and never deviates from that important, and often heartbreaking, humanity. When science appears, it does so effortlessly, with explanations of cell anatomy or techniques like "fluorescence in situ hybridization" seamlessly worked into descriptions of the coloured wards of Johns Hopkins hospital to Lacks's hometown of Clover, Virginia.
Skloot's prose is witty, lyrical, economical and authoritative. But The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is not a comfortable read. Learning about Henrietta's devastating radiation treatments, the history of experiments on black Americans and the events in the book's conclusion are heart-rending. But the story is uplifting too, particularly in a stand-out chapter where Henrietta's children, Deborah and Zakariyya, visit a cancer researcher to see their mother's cells under a microscope.
All of this is to be expected of a book that refuses to shy away from tackling important themes - the interplay between science and ethics, the question of who owns our bodies, and the history of racism in the US. Actually considering these issues seems to be too much for some people, like the anonymous reviewer who appears to be attacking a straw-man version of the book. Those who actually make the effort to read the book and heart the story will be rewarded for it.
For all its grand scope, skilful writing and touching compassion, there is one simple element that makes The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks an instant classic - this is one of those stories that genuinely needed to be told. By right, it will achieve the same immortal status as the cells it describes.
Skloot repeatedly appears as a character in her own book, narrating her journey from first hearing about HeLa cells in a classroom to her attempts to contact and support the Lacks family. Her narration reveals the trials that the Lacks family have undergone since Henrietta's cells went global, and the sheer amount of trust it took to uncover the details of this story.
But this is really a book about three heroines - the two whose names grace the cover and Henrietta's daughter, Deborah Lacks. Skloot's personal mission to tell this story and Deborah's quest to know about her mother's life and legacy are central parts of Henrietta's story and they form some of the book's most compelling segments.
I write this review as someone who isn't typically a fan of historical non-fiction. Particularly in popular science, I often find descriptions of researchers to be distracting attempts at shoehorning in a human element that is out of keeping with the rest of the book. Not so here - this work has the most human of stories at its core, and never deviates from that important, and often heartbreaking, humanity. When science appears, it does so effortlessly, with explanations of cell anatomy or techniques like "fluorescence in situ hybridization" seamlessly worked into descriptions of the coloured wards of Johns Hopkins hospital to Lacks's hometown of Clover, Virginia.
Skloot's prose is witty, lyrical, economical and authoritative. But The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is not a comfortable read. Learning about Henrietta's devastating radiation treatments, the history of experiments on black Americans and the events in the book's conclusion are heart-rending. But the story is uplifting too, particularly in a stand-out chapter where Henrietta's children, Deborah and Zakariyya, visit a cancer researcher to see their mother's cells under a microscope.
All of this is to be expected of a book that refuses to shy away from tackling important themes - the interplay between science and ethics, the question of who owns our bodies, and the history of racism in the US. Actually considering these issues seems to be too much for some people, like the anonymous reviewer who appears to be attacking a straw-man version of the book. Those who actually make the effort to read the book and heart the story will be rewarded for it.
For all its grand scope, skilful writing and touching compassion, there is one simple element that makes The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks an instant classic - this is one of those stories that genuinely needed to be told. By right, it will achieve the same immortal status as the cells it describes.
15 of 16 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This book took me back to human biology classes and to being told about HeLa cells, named after Helen Lane, human cells that were able to reproduce outside the body, given a favourable growing medium.
There was no 'Helen Lane'. There was however, Henrietta Lacks, an African - American woman and mother of five children whose dying body was the source of the original HeLa cells. This is her powerful, beautifully written story and of the effects that story had on her family, particularly her brave and much troubled daughter Deborah.
There are heroes and villains and a fascinating look into life in the southern states of America before the changes wrought by the Civil Rights movement of the Sixties.
This book works on so many levels. Science students will be interested in the back-story to what to them is a laboratory commonplace, social historians will love the careful reconstruction of the period by Ms Skloot and those who love reading an interesting story on a topic of which they knew little or nothing will find much to enjoy.
It's rare to find non-fiction as lyrically written as this. The prose is wonderful, making this a difficult book to put down. The research was impeccable, this book was 10 years in the making and it shows. A book that should be on the reading list of every science student from GCSE upwards. Magical.
There was no 'Helen Lane'. There was however, Henrietta Lacks, an African - American woman and mother of five children whose dying body was the source of the original HeLa cells. This is her powerful, beautifully written story and of the effects that story had on her family, particularly her brave and much troubled daughter Deborah.
There are heroes and villains and a fascinating look into life in the southern states of America before the changes wrought by the Civil Rights movement of the Sixties.
This book works on so many levels. Science students will be interested in the back-story to what to them is a laboratory commonplace, social historians will love the careful reconstruction of the period by Ms Skloot and those who love reading an interesting story on a topic of which they knew little or nothing will find much to enjoy.
It's rare to find non-fiction as lyrically written as this. The prose is wonderful, making this a difficult book to put down. The research was impeccable, this book was 10 years in the making and it shows. A book that should be on the reading list of every science student from GCSE upwards. Magical.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Surprisingly good read
This book was recommended by my local book club and I really wasn't looking forward to reading it, however after the first chapter I was unable to put it down! Read more
Published 26 days ago by Hazel Henn
A book clearly instigated by curiosity
As scientists, we know her as HeLa, but her name was Henrietta Lacks and Rebecca Skloot's award winning book - The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks - takes us on a journey of... Read more
Published 29 days ago by Laboratory Product News
read it!
Everyone remotely involved in science should read this book. It has the perfect mix of science and real life and you will not be able to put it down.
Published 1 month ago by Pm
Much more than i expected
Truly a story of our times. Its sad, its fascinating, its highly educational and it makes you wonder. While reading, I had a couple of questions that werent answered in the book. Read more
Published 1 month ago by Lola Kane
Fascinating!
This is the true story of the life and death of Henrietta Lacks, and of her legacy to medical research, in the form of her cancer cells which are immortal, and have been used all... Read more
Published 2 months ago by Rosina B. Hill
Just phenomenal!
When I first saw the title of this book I thought it was another vampire tale but after reading the details I was grabbed by it and had to read it straight away. Read more
Published 2 months ago by LauraS
An engrossing, emotional and educational read
I bought this book on impulse with fairly low expectations. As a Biology teacher, I had heard of HeLa cells and was vaguely aware that they had been obtained from someone who had... Read more
Published 3 months ago by pinkfeebee
Fascinating story- a must read!
I first read this book nearly 2 years ago after hearing a review about it on the Guardian Science podcast. Read more
Published 3 months ago by Deep
Great book club choice
This book was enjoyed by all in the book club and generated a huge amount of discussion. We all learnt a lot about medical ethics as one in the group is a microbiologist..
Published 3 months ago by Stickie
More human interest than science
This book is well worth reading due primarily to the human interest element rather than science. It left me thinking about bioethics issues, particularly informed consent and end... Read more
Published 3 months ago by Mrs. Wang
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