Praised for its unabashed portrait of the 'death care' industry, HBO's 'Six Feet Under' is less about the business of death than the art of living well. It was created by Alan Ball ('American Beauty') and centres on a Pasadena undertakers run by two brothers, with their mom and teenage sister making up the dysfunctional family quarter. This innovative, controversial show charts difficult territory, from death, dying and bereavement, to female and gay sexualities, laying bare in the process an American cultural consciousness. 'Six Feet Under' first aired among HBO's 'must-see' Sunday night line-up in 2001, going on to establish itself as a critical and ratings winner. This book on the groundbreaking show examines such themes as the modern sacred and profane, pornography and the dead body, magic realism and the grotesque, American cultural politics, self-help culture, family relationships, homosexuality and re-thinking the closet, the church and gay politics, motherhood and teenage rebellion. Entertaining and enlightening in equal measure it contains a complete episode guide to the first four series of 'Six Feet Under'.

Janet McCabe is Lecturer in Film Studies at Trinity College, Dublin Kim Akass is a writer and editor; she is, with Janet McCabe, Series Editor of Tauris' Reading Contemporary Television Series and is on the Editorial Board of the Critical Studies in Television journal. She is co-editor, with Janet McCabe, of Reading 'Sex and the City', Reading 'Six Feet Under', 'Reading 'The L Word', Reading 'Desperate Housewives'and Quality TV all published by I.B. Tauris.