Customer Reviews

Lessons in Taxidermy: A Compendium of Safety and Danger (Punk Planet Books)

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
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2 star:		(1)
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I am stunned by this book and I suggest that everyone should read it. It's a tough and frightening book, but somehow quite uplifting. I feel disoriented and almost drunk after reading it. I somehow feel more vunurable to the possibilities that bad things like this could happen to me too, but also calm. She goes very low and deep into hell, but as the book goes along, she then seems to transcend it all and enjoy her strange life. At the end of the book I almost wanted to be her, and to have her perspective on life. This is a somewhat strange outcome of the book when you consider all the savage events that happen it it. I couldn't put it down. I read it in one long sitting while all of the things I was supposed to do yesterday went undone.

On the back of the book it says that it's "apocryphal, troubling, cathartic, and important". I agree with this 100%

While some of the great work in Bee's life, such as her work as an activist & mentor, is not given the credit or attention it perhaps ought to, what the reader receives is the sense of soul about the author, the woman.

In a world of biographies which read like resumes or entries in a name-dropping contest, Bee's book has substance.

Best of all, this is not some cheesy Little Engine That Could story; Her life hasn't been simple, and neither is her writing.

The book is charming in an uncanny way, with lush words for empty moments, providing real depth for pits of despair. There are eccentric elements which endear... then again, that only makes the echos of the pits stronger...

There are moments so bereft of detail as to leave you as lingering as she... Other moments are so full of details as to be sharp & pointy things.

Certainly the freakish haunts. But her writing draws readers close, with taunt yet tender moments so intimate, it dares you to recoil at the horrific events.

Her words, as well as her life, enchant.

(Condensed Review)

Will make you sad and hate yourself for making light the small things, good ending.
A wicked read, also check out the other Punk Planet books... I've read many and they are also good reads.

Reviewed by Steven Hansen for Small Spiral Notebook

Imagine your body being Murphy's Law official stomping grounds, or as the author explains it to the doctor who is astounded by the abnormally fast clotting properties of her blood, "Whatever should not happen will."

Set in the blue-collar environs of the rural Northwest, Lessons in Taxidermy is Bee Lavender's autobiographical account of her unaccountably bad luck with disease. The ailments come early (rotted teeth from a misguided diet of apple juice in lieu of mother's milk) and often (degenerative cysts growing in her jaw at nine-years-old; cancer by 12). These are only highlights of a terrible litany.

I was used to being alone within illness. The world recedes and other people are just phantoms, whether they are in the room or halfway across the world.

Deserving more than anyone of having herself a never-ending pity party, Lavender doesn't. Her matter-of-fact prose is as detached and spare as the persona her years of illness have sculpted, which makes the book, at times, seemingly lacking in emotional depth. However, this mirrors the tunnel vision that allowed her to cope. Amazingly, nowhere does Lavender speak - at any length at least - about becoming depressed. At an age when most kids were hanging upside down on monkey bars, her life was hanging by a thread, reduced to the simple antipodes of survival, life or death.

Through it all, Lavender manages to finish college, have a kid, get a job and a steady male companion (marriage must not be her bag). And, refreshingly, she doesn't treat these accomplishments as any huge, big deal. Her nonchalance resides in her longtime wish to just `be a normal girl, with regular skin and ordinary clothes, commonplace hobbies and predictable friends.' Even if she isn't.

My primary identity is found in my body, in the scars, in the injuries and injustice and disease and decay. My genetic code conveys the simple truth that I'm a freak: no other information about me is relevant.


...
The fact that I am alive is a daily revelation, but it is necessary to do more than just survive.

Despite the physical Grand Guignol that life has lavished upon her, Bee Lavender's story is a testament to guts, endurance and an indomitable will to not succumb to the maladies that are laying siege to her body. You think nobody knows the trouble you've seen? Read this, and stop whining.

I had been wanting to read this book for a while, and when I finally received it, I read it in 2 days. Bee has had a lifelime of numerous debilitating illnesses and her story of one's strength and courage through it all moved me to tears. On so many occasions, Bee was ready to just lie down and let the diseases consume her but through some hidden strength, she has been able to survive. Several times I had to put the book down to wipe my eyes. The story is told in a frank and honest manner, a story that her mother encouraged her to write to tell a story of survival.

As if Bee's illnesses weren't enough of a cross to bear, she and several of her friends are involved in a horrific car accident that when told, left me sobbing.

What I appreciated the most about Bee's story is that she never seemed to be looking for sympathy or pity. She told it like it happened and the story is all the more powerful because of her candor,

I highly recommend this book.

A rollicking romp through the sidesplitting shenanigans of this goofy gal with a quenchless thirst for thrills! Your funnybone won't know what hit it!

Let me start off by saying a friend lent this book to me knowing how much I treasure helpful, positive books about cancer. I'm not entirely sure if this is a true story or not, but the overly-dramatic writing made me feel like it was an attempt to minimize the struggle of those who truly have cancer. The events didn't seem to tie into the emotions in the story, unless of course the events, or the emotions, were over-exaggerated in a way that reminded me of an old college roommate I suffered through that had been diagnosed with histrionic disorder (where there drama surrounded even the smallest of things).

As far as a book to help those struggling through cancer, I would recommend highly No Place Like Home by Girard, which is very beautifully written and will give the reader more of a feeling of relating to the author.