The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

This book is the story of Henrietta Lacks' family. Henrietta died in 1951 of cervical cancer, but before she died cells from her tumor where taken and used to make the 1st immortal human cell culture. Her cells where used in many many medical advances and are still used in research today. Her family knew nothing about this until the 70's. They are poor and black, and though money has been made buying and selling Henrietta's cells, and form patients the cells help make possible, the none of the Lacks can afford health insurance.

Skloot does provide some science background and explain how the HeLa cell line was used, but she primary focuses on the Lacks family, telling many stories about her interactions with them. I sometimes had trouble empathizing with their lack of education and confusion about science. However I liked how the book used specific people to bring up large unsolved ethical issues.