This is a book about Henrietta Lacks, a young black woman who was a patient at Johns Hopkins in 1951, where she was diagnosed with and agressive form of cervical cancer. Hopkins was involved in an effort to grow cells in vitro, and when her cells were biopsied, they were used not only for diagnosis but also for this research project. And the rest is HeLa history. The cells doubled overnight, and so on and so on. They were first given away and today are sold. There are billions of them in existence currently and no one knows how many have lived over time.
The book focuses largely on Henrietta Lacks family, who struggle to understand what has become of their mother. The author spends a fair amount of time, both i the book and in real life trying to help them work through the role their mother has played in science, and helping them to see it isn't terrible and awful.
But it is also not entirely fair. Their mother didn't give permission, but it wasn't done at the time. Their mother's name is known, which is unheard of today. The story for me is so much about what do you do, ethically, when faced with this dilemma--but the book doesn't go there. Still, I would recommend it as a piece of scientific history as it affects real people.
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