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The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - "The story of modern medicine and bioethics--and, indeed, race relations--is refracted beautifully, and movingly."--Entertainment Weekly

 

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381 pages

Average rating: 8.08

558 RATINGS

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20 REVIEWS

Community Reviews

Dee-no
Feb 26, 2024
10/10 stars
The author a journalist was dead set on telling the story of one heroic young lady who was very courageous of how she gave of herself to help others in conquering the cure for cancer and other diseases we now face…
Deb WBG
Feb 23, 2024
10/10 stars
This was an absolutely FASCINATING read. A perfect blend of science and human interest. Incredibly well researched and due to Rebecca taking great efforts to get to know the descendants of Henrietta Lacks, it felt to be written with empathy, understanding and respect . I loved her style of writing which made the scientific aspects of this book very easy to understand and the interspersing with the human interest side made it feel more of a blend ...read more
Anonymous
Dec 04, 2023
10/10 stars
Highly recommend everyone to read this book. I listened to it on audiobook (12+ hours) and it drew me in each time.

Henrietta Lacks was a black woman born in Virginia who unknowingly gave her cancer cells to Johns Hopkins Hospital. Back in the '50s it wasn't necessary, or even thought of, to ask patients for tissue samples for research. It was just done. When Lacks went to Johns Hopkins for cervical cancer treatments, the doctors took samples of t...read more
leen :))
Dec 01, 2023
8/10 stars
8/10
Ronda
Sep 05, 2023
6/10 stars
Appreciated that author helped family understand the situation.

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