The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

By: Rebecca Skloot

Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell, Bahni Turpin

Length: 12 hrs and 30 mins

Publisher's summary

Number one New York Times best seller.

Now a major motion picture from HBO® starring Oprah Winfrey and Rose Byrne.

One of the “most influential” (CNN), “defining” (Lit Hub), and “best” (The Philadelphia Inquirer) books of the decade.

One of essence’s 50 most impactful Black books of the past 50 years.

Named one of the best books of the year by The New York Times Book Review, Entertainment Weekly, O: The Oprah Magazine, NPR, Financial Times, New York, Independent (UK), Times (UK), Publishers Weekly, Library Journal, Kirkus Reviews, Booklist, Globe, and Mail.

Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. She was a poor Southern tobacco farmer who worked the same land as her slave ancestors, yet her cells - taken without her knowledge - became one of the most important tools in medicine: The first “immortal” human cells grown in culture, which are still alive today, though she has been dead for more than 60 years. HeLa cells were vital for developing the polio vaccine; uncovered secrets of cancer, viruses, and the atom bomb’s effects; helped lead to important advances like in vitro fertilization, cloning, and gene mapping; and have been bought and sold by the billions. Yet Henrietta Lacks remains virtually unknown, buried in an unmarked grave.

Henrietta’s family did not learn of her “immortality” until more than 20 years after her death, when scientists investigating HeLa began using her husband and children in research without informed consent. And though the cells had launched a multimillion-dollar industry that sells human biological materials, her family never saw any of the profits. As Rebecca Skloot so brilliantly shows, the story of the Lacks family - past and present - is inextricably connected to the dark history of experimentation on African Americans, the birth of bioethics, and the legal battles over whether we control the stuff we are made of.

Over the decade it took to uncover this story, Rebecca became enmeshed in the lives of the Lacks family - especially Henrietta’s daughter Deborah. Deborah was consumed with questions: Had scientists cloned her mother? Had they killed her to harvest her cells? And if her mother was so important to medicine, why couldn’t her children afford health insurance? Intimate in feeling, astonishing in scope, and impossible to put down, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks captures the beauty and drama of scientific discovery, as well as its human consequences.

©2010 Rebecca Skloot (P)2010 Random House

Critic reviews

Winner of The Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize for nonfiction

"The story of modern medicine and bioethics - and, indeed, race relations - is refracted beautifully, and movingly.” (Entertainment Weekly)

"Writing with a novelist's artistry, a biologist's expertise, and the zeal of an investigative reporter, Skloot tells a truly astonishing story of racism and poverty, science and conscience, spirituality and family driven by a galvanizing inquiry into the sanctity of the body and the very nature of the life force." (

Booklist)

A story worth knowing

I had heard of Henrietta Lacks in science classes in college, now my daughter is in college and was assigned this book. I got it on audible for her, although later she told me she preferred to read it so she did from her tablet. She was so taken by the book, she then listened and told me I should too.
The book tells the story of the cells but so much more. It gives the family history before the cells were taken and well after and the relationship the author develops with Henrietta’s daughter.
The book illustrates through the telling of the cells and family the sad history of racial discrimination that was the reality during the tim e.
I highly recommend the book. The only reason I gave a 4-star rating the performance was the reader pronounces a culture as “cull chure” and a few others, like kitchen as “kit’ chin,” that I was a little distracted by them, especially culture since it said hundreds of times. Perhaps no one else will notice, otherwise she did an excellent performance!

Must Read

Every person should read this book! I causes you to question your own judgment about life.

Incredible Story of Henrietta Lacks and Her Cells

I had been meaning to read this book for a long time and when it became a selection in my Kindle Challenge, it was time to read and listen. This book tells the story of Henrietta Lacks, suffering from cancer, who has her cells taken without her consent back in the 1950s. Those cells became a sensation, with rare properties that were used in medical research even today. She never knew and her family didn't find out until the 1970s. What follows is a mixture of Henrietta's life story and that of her family, several medical researchers and the progress of the HeLa cells and the state of cell research. There are both villains and heroes among the medical researchers. The family story is heartbreaking. Growing up in poverty with little education and few prospects, the family struggled with abuse, brushes with the law and family issues. Many were understandably angry that the family had little information about Henrietta and received no compensation. Author Rebecca started out to write one story and found another. She became a guide and comfort for the family with her research to find the truth and attempts to teach the family about science, since many hadn't completed enough schooling. That was the heart of the book. The family was finally awarded compensation last year, hopefully future editions will include this information. I listened to the audiobook and it was excellent.

Should be required in schools

This is one of those rare books that not only alters your very perception of the world, but does so in a relatable fashion. You come to learn the personal and overarching story of how much our modern day medicine depended on the pain and suffering of Henrietta Lacks, and how ethics in science require education and empathy with all parties involved. This should be a required reading for high school students, I was thoroughly impacted by Henrietta's story.

A beautiful and sad story

Her life was so unnecessarily difficult. I felt anger at her husband, sorrow for her, and what her family went through is heartbreaking. Good read and an important piece of history

Obvious narrator issue

The book was informative and I love the story. The narrator really ruined it for me with her inability to speak to the nuances of southern aave. it was absolutely awful and she says the n word. I really wish audible had considered the context when choosing a narrator.

Rebecca Skloots dedication prevails

Incredibly engaging and given that this history has so much to do with all humans alive today; also for anyone we know who has not died from a curable infection or certain cancers and that fewer and fewer people die from diseases that are now almost eradicated in many parts of the world, suffering and death are at an all time low due to this amazing woman's cells.

I want to thank Rebecca Skloot for her tenacity and without her willingness to give so much of HER life to telling the truth on this story; we would be forever ignorant to such an important and integral part of all our lives.

The story is one of innocence, intrigue and all out war; a fight that the Lacks family may never win, but with public outcry, and this book; I believe that this part of her story may very well change.

I think that there will always be pushback from the medical and scientific community, when it comes to our rights about our bodies and as human beings. Also, some of the issues raised in this book will be ones we will be addressing for the next few hundred years! I believe that these and others we can not even comprehend; will be issues that societies as a whole will hotly debate and those societies woes in this area will carry on debates of one kind or other for all time.

I highly recommend this book it is truly one that will be cited in history books and should be used (and most likely will be) in all medical and school curriculums.

Non-fiction at its best

This was an outstanding listen, with superb narration. I was impressed with Rebecca Skloot's remarkable powers of observation and objectivity, and found it refreshing not to be walloped by a writer's agenda.

I was expecting the science story to be intriguing, and it is, but the interweaving of the Lacks family members into the fabric of the narrative is masterful. The real-life events of Henrietta's children held me in a grip, and often kept me listening long past the points I planned to pause.

Superb listening experience! An all-time fav.

This book has been a thoroughly engaging listen. I kept thinking, she's told the whole story, what's going to be left for the 2d half, but it's keeps me enthralled for both parts. It's a great scientific and human interest story, in which the author deftly raises a series of important issues of science, race, class, medical and health care, economics, education, and journalism, parenting, family, loss, and mental health,

Phenomenal story! OK performance...

I loved this story! As a non-technical professional, this was the best possible mix of science and human interest.

As for the narrator, I was surprised to see so much praise for her performance. Maybe being an African American woman from the south made me particularly aware of how off her portrayals of black southerners were. I especially found the voices in the dialogues between Henrietta and her family members to extremely hard to listen to and almost offensive. Thankfully that wasn't a significant part of the reading; I couldn't have made it through otherwise. I would have preferred the voice actress who made occasional appearances to have a more prominent role. The narrator did a great job on the other aspects, but I truly cringed, clenched and shuddered almost any time a black "character" had something to say.