Death is an unfamiliar subject. Everyone dies, but we do not know death well. The author of this book is a forensic pathologist who speaks for the dead through autopsies. Deaths that require autopsies vividly reveal hidden problems in our society. Thus, the dead teach the living. Through this book, you will realize that studying death is for the sake of the living.
— Kim Sang-wook, Professor of Physics at Kyung Hee University, author of Sky, Wind, Stars, and Man

The author’s reflections on "death", accumulated over nearly 30 years as a forensic pathologist, never retreat into pedantic speculation or cheap sentimentality. The stories surrounding death in this book are heavy yet not oppressive. In them, there are advices from the death that will someday come to us, and there are scenes of breathtaking beauty born where professional ethics and civic ethics meet.
— Lee So-young, Professor of Social Education at Jeju National University, author of Insignificant Goodness

Professor Lee Ho is an adult I want to emulate. Through this book, I marveled at the insight into life of a person who faces death every day, and I was moved to tears by his sincere entreaties for our community, drawn from countless death scenes. "How should we live?"—to this question that we will endlessly ask until we die, a forensic pathologist who looks beyond death to life offers a weighty and warm answer.
— Do Jun-woo, PD at SBS Current Affairs, author of Beyond the Thrill

★ Rights Sold: Arabic.
★ “If you want to live well, you must learn about death.” The first book by the forensic advisor for SBS’s Unanswered Questions and a guest on tvN’s You Quiz on the Block. With over 30 years as a forensic pathologist, from the Sampoong Department Store collapse to the Sewol ferry disaster, he teaches you how to “live” through “death”.
★ The book unfolds in three progressive parts: how the dead teach the living, the distance between life and death, and our shared death. Finding the power to live within death, it conveys a warm philosophy of life through stories of death: cherish the everyday, love those around you, and find your own meaning within a finite life.
★ A forensic pathologist who has witnessed thousands of deaths uses death stories to give you a “life class for the living”.

“If you want to live well, you must learn about death.”

Approximately 28,000 people in Korea die without a known cause each year. Professor Lee Ho, a forensic pathologist with over 30 years of experience, has performed autopsies on about 4,000 unidentified or suspicious deaths. He has taken part in identifying victims of major disasters, including the Sampoong Department Store collapse and the Sewol ferry disaster. Calling himself “a doctor who speaks only for the dead,” he gives voice to those who can no longer speak through the death stories he has encountered, and asks: How should we face death, and how should we live?

There are times when life feels meaningless, and times when we are gripped by fear of the loss and death that will someday come. At such moments, we need to learn about death. The reason the everyday moments we let slip by are precious, and the reason the people who are simply there beside us deserve our love, is that the answers are often not found in “how to live” but in “death.”

Lee Ho (이호)
A forensic pathologist and professor at Jeonbuk National University Medical School. After graduating from Jeonbuk National University Medical School, he completed his training in pathology at Jeonbuk National University Hospital. In 1998, he began working as a forensic pathologist at the National Forensic Service. From his very first day, he was sent to major disaster scenes that shocked the entire country, including the collapse of the Sampoong Department Store and the fire at the Gyeonggi Women’s Technical School. He continued to take part in investigations of tragic events such as the Daegu subway fire and the Sewol ferry disaster—incidents that have left deep marks in Korea’s modern history.

As a forensic expert, his testimony helped uncover the truth and clear the names of those who had been wrongly imprisoned. Since 2004, he has been a professor at Jeonbuk National University Medical School. He continues to teach students and conducts autopsies on unexplained deaths in the Jeonbuk region. Over 30 years, he has performed approximately 4,000 autopsies, serving as a final advocate for the unjustly deceased.

Introduction
Part 1: The Dead Teach the Living
-The Doctor Who Meets You at Life’s Final Moment
-Visible Lies and Invisible Truths
-No One Heard the Groans That Day
-How Much Should We Grieve for the Death of a Loved One?
-Becoming a Companion to the Most Pitiable
-Exhumation and Defense
-Who Should Save the Drowning Child?
-Some Children Who Are Neither Perpetrators Nor Victims
-The Child I Met Before Life Ended

Part 2: How Far Is Life from Death?
-The Large and Small Points That Lead to Death
-Healing the Hearts of the Bereaved
-On a Life in Search of Meaning
-What Is Good?
-Even a Tiny Fragment
-Never Get Excited
-The One Who Rescued the Most, the One Who Rescued the Least
-People Always Make Mistakes—Me, and You
-Which Came First, the Train or the Railway?

Part 3: My Death, Your Death, and Our Death
-About the 299 Cleanest Bodies
-The Ship Will Sink Again
-The Time It Took for a Couple to Gather a Single Acorn
-I Look at Life from Death
-What Keeps Us Alive Is Ultimately the Power of Love
-We Have the Right to Die Peacefully
-Look at the Human, Not the Body
-My Death, Your Death, Our Death
-A Letter Delivered Too Late

Sources Cited