Books we like ... and books we're not too fussed about
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Julia Solis
Routledge 2005
A bit of a disappointment this one. It promises to show us the “mysteries, beauties, dangers, and desolations” of the world underneath New York: old railway tunnels, sewers, crypts, passages. It could have been fascinating, but Solis ranges too widely; it therefore lacks detail, and for those who don’t know the city well, there’s no map to help. The prose is a bit flat (perhaps because, oddly, she has translated it into English from her own original German edition), and the pictures disappointing and at times poorly reproduced (there are much better ones on the website). All this is a bit strange as Solis is billed as a professional writer and photographer; at times, certainly, the arty perspective is too dominant for my liking (I’d have liked more route maps and details of disused subway stops, but that’s just me). Overall it’s an interesting introduction which promises more than it delivers and strays into the pretentious at times (from its subtitle onwards really: The Anatomy of a City). I did learn however where all that steam rising from the manhole covers comes from: it actually is steam, still delivered by underground pipe to numerous offices in the city for heating). It seems this book is now quite hard to find, if the sample prices on Amazon are anything to go by; I picked this up a year ago in a remainder shop in Bath for just a few pounds, and so feel a bit chuffed to have it nevertheless.
22nd June 2009
http://www.solis.darkpassage.com/
Just click below.
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