[Buddha-l] Emptiness and not being able to imagine dying [confused]

[lemmett at talk21.com]

Hello.
Can anyone recommend a book on emptiness or the two truths in east asian Buddhism?Also I am a little confused about Chih-I's classifications of the two truths from Swanson's book. In what sense can the emptiness of illusory existence be a conventional truth?
My other concern and reason for writing to the list is about annihilation. If there's no awareness at all at the moment of death but there is the moment before, how can I conceptualize the latter becoming the former: I have to have the idea of permanently losing awareness and I can't see how that's to happen without someone being aware of that - in which case it is persists in some form.
Thinking of it as a stream of elements that are replaced by new ones: if the last dharma is replaced then that's no annihilation, if not where does it go? It don't think can be quite like a fire burning out because a fire doesn't have self cognition. 
Is this just entirely non Buddhist?
Or can what I've said be related to e.g. 'annihilation' in Buddhism or the Tathagata's silence on what happens to him at death? Do all Buddhists think that the aggregates *completely* burn away at death and that there can be no experience if that's the case? If so in what way might the Tathagata not not exist at death?
Hope that makes sense and thanks for any help!