Resistance to mortality has inspired mortals to create mythical tales, conduct alchemical experiments and, more recently, to undertake groundbreaking medical research that seems to bring the ‘elixir of eternal youth’ within reach. In his new carefully researched and entertainingly written book, Frank Westerman weaves together the four letters of life – the DNA building blocks A, C, G and T – into a contemporary quest for immortality. From ancient standing stones to bodies found preserved in melting glaciers to Gilgamesh and modern cryogenics.
The A stands for ‘alpha’, the beginning. After burying his parents, the writer returns to the soil of Drenthe from which he sprang, in search of mammoth molars and the builders of the standing stones, the ‘hunebeds’.
The C stands for ‘conservation’, preservation. A spine-chilling climb takes the reader to the melting Alpine glacier from which the 5,300-year-old Ötzi emerged. What does this ‘oldest European’ tell us?
The G stands for ‘Gilgamesh’. Where the legendary king of Mesopotamia failed in the twenty-seventh century BC, today’s kings of big business are once again pursuing immortality. The author requests a quote to have himself cryogenically frozen after death – just like Ötzi.
The T stands for ‘technology’ that defies the imagination. At Pearl Bay in Shenzhen, he manages to gain access to China’s National Gene Bank, where bioengineers are working on the resurrection of the extinct mammoth.
Frank Westerman brings the storylines together, in a way that will linger in the reader’s mind for a long time to come.
Sales
- Querido Fosfor Netherlands (November 2026)
- UMco Slovenia
Material: PDF of the Dutch edition