Rebecca Skloot
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About Rebecca Skloot
Rebecca Skloot is an award-winning science writer whose articles have appeared in The New York Times Magazine; O, The Oprah Magazine; Discover; and others. She has worked as a correspondent for NPR’s Radiolab and PBS’s NOVA scienceNOW, and is a contributing editor at Popular Science magazine and guest editor of The Best American Science Writing 2011. She is a former Vice President of the National Book Critics Circle and has taught creative nonfiction and science journalism at the University of Memphis, the University of Pittsburgh, and New York University. Her debut book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, took more than ten years to research and write, and became an instant New York Times bestseller. She has been featured on numerous television shows, including CBS Sunday Morning and The Colbert Report. Her book has received widespread critical acclaim, with reviews appearing in The New Yorker, Washington Post, Science, Entertainment Weekly, People, and many others. It won the Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize and the Wellcome Trust Book Prize, and was named The Best Book of 2010 by Amazon.com, and a Best Book of the Year by Entertainment Weekly; O, The Oprah Magazine; The New York Times; Washington Post; US News & World Report; and numerous others.
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is being translated into more than twenty languages, and adapted into a young adult book, and an HBO film produced by Oprah Winfrey and Alan Ball. Skloot lives in Chicago but regularly abandons city life to write in the hills of West Virginia, where she tends to find stray animals and bring them home. She travels extensively to speak about her book. For more information, visit RebeccaSkloot.com, where you will find book special features, including photos and videos, as well as her book tour schedule, and links to follow her and The Immortal Life on Twitter and Facebook.
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Blog postJoin us as we honor the 100th anniversary of the birth of Henrietta Lacks. Born on August 1, 1920, Henrietta, was a wife, mother of five, and resident of Turner Station, Maryland – and the Mother of Modern Medicine,” who changed the world with the gift of her immortal HeLa cells.
The Lacks family is launching a yearlong centennial cellebration with the #HELA100 Virtual Symposium.
Learn More →
2 years ago Read more -
Blog postClick here for a behind the scenes look from The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks airing Saturday, April 22nd at 8:00 pm ET / 5:00 pm PT on HBO.
6 years ago Read more -
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Blog postFabulous news: HBO Films has begun shooting the film adaptation of Rebecca’s book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, which will star Oprah Winfrey as Henrietta’s daughter Deborah Lacks and Rose Byrne as Rebecca Skloot and Renee Elise Goldsberry as Henrietta Lacks. More casting information available here, and on the film’s IMDB page. You can follow photos and news of the making of the film on Rebecca’s Instagram feed and on her Facebook page.
6 years ago Read more -
Blog postYour cells and genetic information can be used in research without your knowledge — this happens all the time. It leads to important medical advances we all want to benefit from, but should scientists have to ask your permission first? The federal government has proposed controversial changes to the rules governing tissue research, which would — for the first time — require consent for research on all blood and tissues you leave behind after a visit to the doctor. This could all change (or fi7 years ago Read more
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Blog postOn March 23, 2013, Rebecca Skloot wrote an OpEd for The New York Times titled, “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks: The Sequel.” It begins like this:
LAST week, scientists sequenced the genome of cells taken without consent from a woman named Henrietta Lacks. She was a black tobacco farmer and mother of five, and though she died in 1951, her cells, code-named HeLa, live on. They were used to help develop our most important vaccines and cancer medications, in vitro fertilization, gen9 years ago Read more -
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Blog postThe story goes on: Recently, scientists announced that they’d sequenced the genome of Henrietta Lacks’s cells and published it online, where it was freely available to anyone who cared to download it. When news of the genome hit, Rebecca Skloot’s inbox exploded. People wanted to know: did scientists get the family’s permission to sequence publish Henrietta’s genetic information (which also contains genetic information about her family)? The answer is no. As Francis S. Collins, director of the9 years ago Read more
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Blog postWorld Book Night was celebrated in cities all over the United States on April 23, 2012 when 25,000 givers across the country distributed half a million free books, including The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. It was an amazing night in Baltimore, Maryland where author Rebecca Skloot and the Lacks family distributed over 300 copies of The Immortal Life to adults who would otherwise never have gotten copies of the book.
It was a whirlwind day of events beginning wit10 years ago Read more -
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Blog postContact: David Drake
212-782-9001; ddrake@randomhouse.com
THE IMMORTAL LIFE OF HENRIETTA LACKS AUTHOR REBECCA SKLOOT
TO EXPLORE HUMAN-ANIMAL BOND IN NEW BOOK FOR CROWN
(New York, NY — October 13, 2011) Rebecca Skloot, the author of the multi-year, critically acclaimed, nonfiction bestseller The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, has reached agreement with Crown Publishers to write a new book that will focus on the human-animal bond and explore some of the biggest, a10 years ago Read more -
Blog postSteve Silberman over at NeuroTribes recently asked several writers to share stories about teachers who’d had important impacts on their lives. Here is Rebecca’s contribution about her experience going through school, and the way her own path changed:
As people who’ve read The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks know, I first learned about Henrietta and her amazing HeLa cells in a basic biology class when I was 16 years old. My teacher, Mr. Defler, wrote Henrietta’s name on the chalkboard10 years ago Read more -
Blog postPlease redirect your browsers to Culture Dish's new home, where we've just put up the inaugural welcome post. There you will find an RSS to subscribe to so you can follow Culture Dish wherever it goes next (which we very much hope you'll do).12 years ago Read more
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Blog postAs I said yesterday on Twitter, a big conflict of interest and transparency problem has arisen on ScienceBlogs. Like several other bloggers here, I'm now on a hiatus, however like like David Dobb's and Blake Stacy's, my hiatus from ScienceBlogs will be permanent. I've been contemplating a move from ScienceBlogs for a while for several reasons, but PepsiGate has sealed the deal for me. Several of my ScienceBlogs colleagues have summed up the situation well, including PZ Myers, GrrlScie12 years ago Read more
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Blog postI've been working for a while to develop a Frequently Asked Questions page to answers the most common reader questions about The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. Well, it's now online, and it addresses questions ranging from why HeLa cells are immortal to how the Lacks family is benefiting from the book. It also includes answers to commonly asked publishing questions, like, How do I break into science writing? You can read it online here. If you have burning questions not answ12 years ago Read more
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Blog postA press release landed in my inbox today with this headline, which raised my eyebrows (as it was obviously intended to do): "First Experiment to Attempt Prevention of Homosexuality in Womb." It starts with this quote from Alice Dreger, a Northwestern University bioethicist: "This is the first we know in the history of medicine that clinicians are actively trying to prevent homosexuality." The release was announcing the publication of a piece at the Hastings Center Bioet12 years ago Read more
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Blog postAnyone interested in Henrietta Lacks and the grave marker finally placed on her long unmarked grave this weekend should click here immediately for a beautiful post by scientist David Kroll, who attended the unveiling ceremony. It's filled with beautiful photos of the day, and a tribute to all Henrietta's cells did for science. His photo below shows Henrietta's new headstone in much sharper detail than the one I posted yesterday with the text of the inscription. Visit his p12 years ago Read more
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Blog postToday is a very exciting day: Henrietta Lacks (aka HeLa) has been lying in an unmarked grave since her death in 1951. Today, thanks to Dr. Roland Pattillo at Morehouse School of Medicine, who donated a headstone after reading The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, her grave is finally marked. Below, a snapshot of some members of the Lacks family beside the new marker for Henrietta, and the marker for her daughter, Elsie, which was also unveiled today. Dr. Roland Pattillo is pict12 years ago Read more
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Blog postThings have been a bit quiet here as I finished up my crazy four-month-long book tour, and there's much to catch up on. First, some big news just in: Oprah, Alan Ball, and HBO are going to be making a movie version of my book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. This news has gotten quite a bit of coverage on Twitter and elsewhere, with me fielding questions about the movie, and various folks voting on who should play which character in the film (not that I have any control over12 years ago Read more
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Blog postI'm posting answers to FAQs about my book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, as an ongoing series on this blog. In my last FAQ post, I told the story of how I first learned about HeLa cells at sixteen. A related question I often get has to do with this one sentence in the book's prologue: "I was a kid who'd failed freshman year at the regular public high school because she never showed up. I'd transferred to an alternative school that offered dream studies instead of biology13 years ago Read more
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Blog postI mentioned a while ago that I'll be posting answers to FAQs about my book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, as an ongoing series on this blog.
I thought I'd start the FAQs with one of the most commonly asked questions: How did you learn about Henrietta and the HeLa cells, and why did they grab you the way they did? Here is the answer, which I also posted about over on Powells.com's book blog this last week as part of a little guest blogging stint:
Read the rest13 years ago Read more -
Blog postPeople often ask whether the Lacks family has joined me for any of my book tour events, and how they feel about the book. Here, in the first of what will be several trailers of The Immortal Book Tour, you can see bits of the tour, including the blizzard that nearly prevented me from getting there, many great photos, footage of several Lacks family members talking about The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, and more (video by Mr. Culture Dish, David Prete):
Read the rest of th13 years ago Read more -
Blog postAs some of you may have noticed, things have been a weeeeeeee bit quiet here at Culture Dish. This is what happens when a person embarks on a totally insane book tour. I've been on the road for two months straight since the publication of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, giving talks, signing books, meeting readers, and doing lots and lots and lots of interviews for TV and radio (talking to folks like Stephen Colbert, Jim Axelrod of CBS Sunday Morning, Terry Gross, and many othe13 years ago Read more
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Blog postToday's Baltimore Sun features a great OpEd by Ruth Faden, director of the bioethics institute at Johns Hopkins, exploring the ethical and moral issues raised by The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, and its relevance to the current debate over health care reform. In it she says, among other things:
Read the rest of this post... | Read the comments on this post...13 years ago Read more -
Blog postA quick post as I run out the door for the teeveey studio: Set your TiVos and your DVRs, mark your calendars: Tonight I'll be on ABC World News talking about my new book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. The segment will also feature members of Henrietta's family, and Vincent Racaniello with lots, and lots of HeLa cells.
ALSO: The first reviews of The Immortal Life are starting to hit newspapers. There's a terrific review on the front page of the Washington Po13 years ago Read more -
Blog postAfter ten long years, the serious countdown has begun for the publication of my book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, which will be on sale nationwide exactly SEVEN DAYS from today. I've been posting about my impending book tour, and all the great coverage the book has been getting, on Twitter and Facebook, but thought I'd also post a bit of a press round up here, and an update, for those who (gasp) don't spend all of their time in those places.
If you don't know13 years ago Read more -
Blog postI've been meaning to post about this for several weeks, but as we all know, things have been a weee bit hectic. But now, finally: News on the informed consent for using tissues in research front.
Read the rest of this post... |13 years ago Read more
Titles By Rebecca Skloot
NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE FROM HBO® STARRING OPRAH WINFREY AND ROSE BYRNE • ONE OF THE “MOST INFLUENTIAL” (CNN), “DEFINING” (LITHUB), AND “BEST” (THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER) BOOKS OF THE DECADE • ONE OF ESSENCE’S 50 MOST IMPACTFUL BLACK BOOKS OF THE PAST 50 YEARS • WINNER OF THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE HEARTLAND PRIZE FOR NONFICTION
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The New York Times Book Review • Entertainment Weekly • O: The Oprah Magazine • NPR • Financial Times • New York • Independent (U.K.) • Times (U.K.) • Publishers Weekly • Library Journal • Kirkus Reviews • Booklist • Globe and Mail
Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. She was a poor Southern tobacco farmer who worked the same land as her slave ancestors, yet her cells—taken without her knowledge—became one of the most important tools in medicine: The first “immortal” human cells grown in culture, which are still alive today, though she has been dead for more than sixty years. HeLa cells were vital for developing the polio vaccine; uncovered secrets of cancer, viruses, and the atom bomb’s effects; helped lead to important advances like in vitro fertilization, cloning, and gene mapping; and have been bought and sold by the billions.
Yet Henrietta Lacks remains virtually unknown, buried in an unmarked grave.
Henrietta’s family did not learn of her “immortality” until more than twenty years after her death, when scientists investigating HeLa began using her husband and children in research without informed consent. And though the cells had launched a multimillion-dollar industry that sells human biological materials, her family never saw any of the profits. As Rebecca Skloot so brilliantly shows, the story of the Lacks family—past and present—is inextricably connected to the dark history of experimentation on African Americans, the birth of bioethics, and the legal battles over whether we control the stuff we are made of.
Over the decade it took to uncover this story, Rebecca became enmeshed in the lives of the Lacks family—especially Henrietta’s daughter Deborah. Deborah was consumed with questions: Had scientists cloned her mother? Had they killed her to harvest her cells? And if her mother was so important to medicine, why couldn’t her children afford health insurance?
Intimate in feeling, astonishing in scope, and impossible to put down, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks captures the beauty and drama of scientific discovery, as well as its human consequences.
This anthology of essays and articles explores topics ranging from untouched wilderness to scientific ethics—and the nature of curiosity itself.
Scientists and writers are both driven by a dogged curiosity, immersing themselves in detailed observations that, over time, uncover larger stories. As Rebecca Skloot says in her introduction, all the stories in this collection are “written by and about people who take the time, and often a substantial amount of risk, to follow curiosity where it may lead, so we can all learn about it.”
The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2015 includes work from both award-winning writers and up-and-coming voices in the field. From Brooke Jarvis on deep-ocean mining to Elizabeth Kolbert on New Zealand’s unconventional conservation strategies, this is a group that celebrates the growing diversity in science and nature writing alike. Altogether, the writers honored in this volume challenge us to consider the strains facing our planet and its many species, while never losing sight of the wonders we’re working to preserve for generations to come.
This anthology includes essays and articles by Sheri Fink, Atul Gawande, Leslie Jamison, Sam Kean, Seth Mnookin, Matthew Power, Michael Specter and others.