Don’t let the title fool you: this isn’t a morbid book. It’s a collection of stories about death and dying, yes, but death isn’t morbid in itself. Death is a fact, sudden or sad, tragic or inevitable, and it can leave us bereft – but it isn’t morbid. Our perception of it often is. But it doesn’t have to be.
The dead don’t need anything from us; it’s the living that need our kindness. All we can do for the dead, if we feel that something must be done, is to use the privileges of the living. To laugh and cry, to ring the bells and turn up when we’re needed. To find a better place in this life, and live it in the most uncontained way possible, and be more careful of the memories we make than the memories we’ll keep.
Death by any other name is available to buy in paperback and on Kindle, or read for free on Kindle Unlimited.