Freezing People is Not Easy (four stars)

Bob Nelson was there at the very beginnings of Cryonics, the science of freezing people in the hope of returning them to life at a future date, free of the disease that killed them and ready to resume life. However, as Nelson noted, this is not a simple task. Aside from the technical issues with properly freezing a body you have to deal with grieving family members and money. All three of these became a headache for Mr. Nelson as time went by, from the need for cryo-capsules (never acquire one from a wigmaker), to family members emphatically against the freezing of their loved one (despite his or her wishes) to deadbeats who fail to pay for upkeep on the materials needed to maintain capsules at a proper temperature or even to pay costs agreed upon in advance. Some of these issues are the same as those funeral directors have to deal with. In any case, it is an interesting read and Nelson, who was part of the team who froze the first human to be cryogenically preserved, is the just the person to tell it.