Death for Beginners: Your No-Nonsense, Money-Saving Guide to Planning for the Inevitable, by Karen Jones (Quill Driver Books, 2010)

Call me crazy, but I'm beginning to get comfortable with the idea of planning for my demise. Well, not the time, place, or method of my actual demise—I'm still opting for life in the physical realm for a lot of years to come—but, thanks to books like Death for Beginners, I'm learning that I might enjoy making plans for how to dispose of my "remains," what kind of memorial tribute I'd like, how to make my wishes known to others, and many other details that rush in demanding to be decided once death has occurred.

Without such planning, those details are necessarily left to family members who must focus on practical matters at a vulnerable and confusing time.

Where to begin? This book makes it laughably easy. Its author, a former television news anchor and feature reporter, gives readers lots of opportunities to laugh their way through the decision-making process. Along with details on options, including pricing, she includes anecdotes on famous people's choices (Hugh Hefner's vault will be right next to Marilyn Monroe's) and a plethora of interesting Web sites. (To choose a coffin shaped like a bird cage, a guitar, or a giant wine cork, see www.CrazyCoffins.co.uk. Several sites offer personalized choices for cremated remains, including key chains, pendant necklaces, and digital photo frame urns.)

Jones includes several "opinion statements" designed to guide you through. If you want to look good for others even in death, you might want to investigate the "new fashion trend": post-mortem plastic surgery. If you want one last chance to reduce your carbon footprint, you can choose a biodegradable Ecopod. Another emerging trend is to be buried with your cell phone or iPod. And if being outrageously nontraditional is your thing, you might try alkaline hydrolysis, or water resolution, a process using heated water and pressure to accelerate the decomposition process and leave a liquid "that can be dried into a form resembling ashes."

Memories of You: A Healing Journey Through the Garden of Grief, by William G. Ladewig and Paula W. Dail (WritingLad LLC, 2010)

Although not for everyone, this slim volume takes a workbook approach to dealing with grief about the loss of a close friend, family member, or beloved pet. In the introduction, the authors state, "This book uses the power of words, combined with photographs and whatever else you want to include, to help you record cherished memories of someone who helped make you who you are at this moment, and will remain a part of your life forever."

If you're a person who likes to journal, create scrapbooks, or simply jot down thoughts, this book may appeal to you. Although the authors take a somewhat simplistic approach to the complexities of grief, they are wise enough to include room for recording flaws and imperfections. They also provide space to record memorial service details and ruminate over new rituals that may help preserve memories.

The garden metaphor appears throughout: What flowers or trees best describe your beloved's family relationships? How would you describe the garden you have planted as you have endeavored to remember them? The book contains blank pages for writing or inserting photos, each page containing shadowy images of butterflies and trees.

This approach will not appeal to everyone, but if you're a visually oriented person it offers a method of coping with the difficult emotions that surround death and grief.
At the end of the book is a brief section called "Helpful Information." It seems an afterthought because it deals with details such as writing an obituary and what to do with death certificates. The section seems inconsistent in both tone and time frame with the main purpose of the book.