We Decided That We Would Have A Soda; My Favorite Flavor, Cherry Red

To start, Caitlin Doughty's Smoke Gets in Your Eyes is good. For one, it's an interesting first-person account of the world of crematory operators, a world that stays mostly hidden, probably mostly because no one really wants to think about it. I'm pretty sure I assumed that cemeteries did that on the side or something, so it was interesting to hear about this world. Eyes is also compelling because the narrator isn't some grizzled veteran — she self-deprecatingly describes herself at points as a dilettante or "girl playing dress up," and the narrative unfolds from her first days on the job.

At least one of us was annoyed by the notion that she — or anyone — does something simply to write about it, or parlay it into a book or some such; I don't disagree, but in an era when every experience is utterly mediated, what difference does it make? Also, if it makes someone more engaged, what's the harm? Just relax and let go; soon the entire planet will be one giant StoryCorps booth.

My only criticism — and it's probably not a fair one, but it's there nonetheless — is that the writing seems like a first pass. And by "first pass" I don't mean first draft but rather the first thing that gets written is the thing that shows up in the final version. In other words, you don't the sense that the ideas were chewed over, mulled over, synthesized, perseverated upon, synergized or whatever else. On the one hand, no one needs it to be that artful — there's a thing going on in the blog era where readers seem to find deeper meaning in knowing about the unmediated firsthand experiences of people, or specifically careers; thus, "Ask a [blank]," whether it's a pilot or a real estate broker or a crematory operator. It's just source material. But at the same time I think it actually could be extraordinary, and that's what's a little frustrating: it's a completely unusual story that dives deep into the guiding force of human existence with tremendous amounts of gallows humor and a pitch-perfect voice — and I want to hear more from this person. Think Joan Didion, Renata Adler, whoever else — we used to write shit in this country, think about shit; now we just crib from our own blogs and hit send.

Why not fair? For one, if it were a totally idiotic book this wouldn't come up, but since it's not, like I said, you want to see more. That said, I imagine an editor is like, sure, fine, don't bother to do more: 97 to 98 percent of the readers don't care if it's extraordinary. And whatever. It's whatever. But whatever. And also, she does find a deeper meaning to all of it except that it's a call to action: people, get more in touch with death rituals. Which is fine, except that — I don't know, maybe it's just me but — I really don't give a shit about calls to action. At least when it comes to books. An op-ed, sure, but a book is just . . . tiresome.

Maybe that's the thing: do books these days want to get you to do something? To change your behavior? To turn "effect" into a flabby transitive verb? My hunch is they do — books can be quite demanding in that respect. Which is weird, because how many people still even read books?