Evoking the unimaginable horror of premature burial, The Lazarus Syndrome traces the history of this grisly phenomenon---as well as premature dissection, untimely cremation, and the embalming of the living. Rodney Davies recounts unseemly cases, both literal and literary, of misdiagnosis and miraculous escapes from premature interment. Explaining the generally accepted ways of determining death---lack of pulse and visible respiration---Davis shows how misleading these indicators can be. Immobilized by trance, coma, or catalepsy, thousands have suffered the chilling consequences of misdiagnosis. While the discovery of unwarranted cremations and premature burials has most often come too late to save the ...