Book: "Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers" by Mary Roach
"The human head is of the same approximate size and weight as a roaster chicken," the first sentence reads. This book is a cultural and historical survey of how people deal with, have dealt with, and possibly will deal with the ultimate taboo -- death. Roach's writing is sharply observant and morbidly charming. She employs the thoroughness of an embalmer, the tact of a funeral director and the wit of a gravedigger. I recommend this book whether or not you plan to die someday; as Socrates might have said, an unexamined death is not worth dying. - Latif Nasser
Music: "A Century of Covers" Bell and Sebastian Tribute by various artists
It's so difficult to cover a band like Belle and Sebastian because, hey, they're Belle and Sebastian. In 10 years, this Glaswegian band has put out seven full albums, and now they've got a tribute album (which is free on the internet, folks). Highlights include: Bob Corn's "I'm Waking Up to Us" (which flips the original inside-out), Billie The Vision's "I'm a Cuckoo" (which strips the original down to it's plainly pretty unmentionables) and Perturbazione's rendition of "Get Me Away From Here I'm Dying" (which basically just translates the original into Italian). - Latif Nasser
Movie: "Stealing Beauty," directed by Bernardo Bertolucci (1996)
Bernardo Bertolucci's "Stealing Beauty" is the coming of age story of Lucy (Liv Tyler), an American girl staying with her mother's aging bohemian friends in Tuscany. Tyler is positively beautiful as she teeters on the edge between childhood and adulthood, while Jeremy Irons plays a dying writer with the perfect mix of grace and poignancy. But the most attractive character of all is the Italian countryside, which makes even the scenery in "Under the Tuscan Sun" seem drab and dreary. - Amy Davis
TV: "Trading Spaces," TLC Saturdays at 10 p.m.
Best known as the show that brought popular home design to the masses, TLC's sleeper hit "Trading Spaces" helped propel the channel into prominence. Interior designs range from elegantly refined to wacky and unexpected to frankly inappropriate. (Seriously, a toilet as a chair in a dungeon-themed bedroom?) Each episode ends in a final "reveal," when homeowner satisfaction is gauged in either tears of joy or tears of agony. -- Jean Luo
