Dying to Meet You: Confessions of a Funeral Director

Why would someone leave a shining career in management to work among the dead?Angjolie Mei, funeral director and "life celebrant", recounts how the death of her father—a veteran known as 'The Coffin King' in the funeral industry—prompted this dramatic choice. What exactly happens during embalming? What kind of post-death restoration is needed for second-degree burn victims? What are the little-known facts surrounding suicide in Singapore?Angjolie offers the insider's view on these and other aspects of an industry usually shrouded in mystery, and reflects on how her perceptions of death, and life, have changed since she chose this extraordinary profession. During the Christmas holidays in 2004, an earthquake in the Indian Ocean triggers a tsunami that devastates fourteen countries. Two couples from Singapore are vacationing in Phuket when the tsunami strikes. Alternating between the aftermath of the catastrophe and past events that led these characters to that fateful moment, Now That It's Over weaves a tapestry of causality and regret, and chronicles the physical and emotional wreckage wrought by natural and manmade disasters.