EDITOR'S CORNER

There aren't many perks that come with an editors job. (This editor anyway!) But over the years, we have received three. The first was an online version of The First Immortal sent by James Halperin.

Then a few years ago, the English publisher Hodder & Stoughton sent us Barry Albin's Don't Drop the Coffin. And now again thanks to Barry Albins literary efforts, we've received from the same Publisher, Final Departures, an appropriate title for an Albin project. It is billed as "Around the World with Britains most Remarkable Undertaker."

The Press Release that came with the book is in this issue. We have looked through the book briefly. The first three pages of the cryonics chapter sound like a CI ad. In fact they almost are word for word from the ad on the inside front cover of The Immortalist!

There are some morbid things like the fellow in Arizona who had his 29 year old wife embalmed at her death, and placed in a glass coffee table. There is a photo, presumably of the husband sitting on the couch, looking at "Lucy." There's also an interesting description of an automated Chinese crematorium that cremates 300 bodies a day.

As we mentioned previously, in the press release, there is only a two line mention of Alcor. The Cryonics Institute and CI are mentioned 32 times. Maybe the guy just loves us! While we are not going to lose any sleep over this, it seems as though any objective view of the cryonics movement in this country would not be complete without giving Alcor a little more mention, just as the same view would not be complete if CI were relegated to two lines.

In the chapter on cremation, he claims we have eleven states that have no regulations about crematories. If they view death so casually, perhaps one of these states would be a suitable home for Suspended Animation.