Meet the Bourdain of Death

Caitlin Doughty is obsessed with death—but in a good way.

She’s turned her fascination with funerals and corpses into a successful career as a mortician, activist, YouTube star, and bestselling author.

As founder of The Order of the Good Death, she’s spearheaded a movement called Death Positive, which give people various outlets to deal with their fears of death. Her funeral home, Undertaking LA, aims to treat the dead with dignity.

Caitlin’s books are must-reads for anyone interested in what becomes of your body after you become not living anymore. Her first book, Smoke Gets in Your Eyes, is a funny and morbid memoir about her life as a crematory operator and mortician. In in her new book, From Here to Eternity, Caitlin plays the role of the Bourdain of Death, reporting on the bizarre and sometimes beautiful death rituals in countries such as Indonesia, Japan, and right here in the U.S. of A.

In the podcast, we talk about the event that lead to her fascination with death, what it was like working at a crematory, how and why American culture is so weirded about death--and what we can do about it.