'The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks brings to mind the work of Philip K. Dick and Edgar Allan Poe. But this tale is true. Rebecca Skloot explores the racism and greed, the idealism and faith in science that helped to save thousands of lives but nearly destroyed a family. This is an extraordinary book, haunting and beautifully told'

'One of the most graceful and moving non-fiction books I've read in a very long time. A thorny and provocative book about cancer, racism, scientific ethics and crippling poverty, The Immortal'. Life of Henrietta Lacks floods over you like a narrative dam break, as if someone had managed to distill and purify the more addictive qualities of Erin Brockovich, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil and The Andromeda Strain... It has brains and pacing and nerve and heart, and it is uncommonly endearing'

A Few Words About This Book

Prologue: The Woman in the Photograph

Deborah's Voice

Part One LIFE

1. The Exam... 1951

2. Clover... 1920-1942

3. Diagnosis and Treatment... 1951

4. The Birth of HeLa... 1951

5. "Blackness Be Spreadin All Inside"... 1951

6. "Lady's on the Phone"... 1999

7. The Death and Life of Cell Culture... 1951

8. "A Miserable Specimen"... 1951

9. Turner Station... 1999

10. The Other Side of the Tracks... 1999

11. "The Devil of Pain Itself" ... 1951

Part Two DEATH

12. The Storm... 1951

13. The HeLa Factory... 1951-1953

14. Helen Lane... 1953-1954

15. "Too Young to Remember"... 1951-1965

16. "Spending Eternity in the Same Place"... 1999

17. Illegal, Immoral, and Deplorable... 1954-1966

18. "Strangest Hybrid"... 196O-1966

19. "The Most Critical Time on This Earth Is Now"...1966-1973

20. The HeLa Bomb... 1966

21. Night Doctors... 2000

22. "The Fame She So Richly Deserves"... 1970-1973

Part Three IMMORTALITY

23. "It's Alive"... 1973-1974

24. "Least They Can Do"... 1975

25. "Who Told You You Could Sell My Spleen?"... 1976-1988

26. Breach of Privacy... 1980-1985

27. The Secret of Immortality... 1984-1995

28. After London... 1996-1999

29. A Village of Henriettas... 2000

30. Zakariyya... 2000

31. Hela, Goddess of Death... 2000-2001

32. "All That's My Mother"... 2001

33. The Hospital for the Negro Insane... 2001

34. The Medical Records... 2001

35. Soul Cleansing... 2001

36. Heavenly Bodies... 2001

37. "Nothing to Be Scared About"... 2001

38. The Long Road to Clover... 2009

Where They Are Now

Afterword