When the very much alive Leocadia Arlington requests her own obituary by the end of the week, and then turns up dead, obituary writer Winter Snow falls under suspicion and, with the help of friends and family, must uncover the killer before the next obituary written is her own.

A luridly compelling and hilariously macabre look at how the famous took their final bows-from Socrates to Anna Nicole!

A light-hearted look at the history and practice of "the ultimate human-interest story," the obituary. "What a wonderful surprise-a charming, lyrical book about the men and women who write obituaries. The Dead Beat is sly, droll, and completely winning."- David Halberstam Where can readers celebrate the life of the pharmacist who moonlighted as a spy, the genius behind Sea Monkeys, the school lunch lady who spent her evenings as a ballroom hostess?...