All I want for Christmas is ... life and death

So ... I'm being ridiculed by my family just because three items on my holiday wishlist include the words "life" and "death" --

Katherine Boo, Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity
Jill Lepore, The Mansion of Happiness:  A History of Life and Death
Bernd Heinrich, Life Everlasting: The Animal Way of Death

Gloomy, me? Oh come on. I also asked for the book