Wonderful storyteller but with a broken crystal ball perhaps

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	• The Ghost Map: The Story of London's Most Terrifying Epidemic--and How It Changed Science, Cities, and the ... Steven Johnson Riverhead Trade, 2007 - 320 pages average customer review:based on 92 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

i would give it 4.5 if i can

well written. interesting. facinated history about london past. and i am not going to a victorian celler any more!

If you want plague, read this other book instead!

I haven't read this book, but if you want a stellar historical novel on times of plague (16th century England this time), read Geraldine Brooks _Year of Wonders_. Not only is it absolutely riveting, but it is beautifully and meticulously written, with unforgettable characters. You will not be able to put it down, and it will stay with you for a long time. It is easily one of the best books I've ever read.

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Great topic, mediocre execution

I missed the whole "Everything bad is good..." phase of SJ's career, and was introduced to him through his series of pieces he wrote for the NYTimes earlier this year. I liked his work there, and think that outside.in, the website spawned by "Ghost Map", seems like a genuinely inspired idea. I generally share Johnson's interest in urbanism, and find his optimism refreshing.

That said, Ghost Map is not a great book. It is based on research that's been better carried out by other scholars, and better told elsewhere. (Indeed, considering the number of graduate students interested in 19th century London, I wouldn't be surprised to find some dissertation lurking out there that's drawn some more profound conclusions than Johnson.) The redundancy of passages in Ghost Map is one thing, and the heavy-handedness of Johnson's conclusions is another. But the thing that strikes me most is this: Johnson has earned himself a comfortable place in the publishing world and at NYU by grappling with the epidemiology and neuroscience and applying it to pop culture. But Johnson is perhaps too securely esconced in the metropole. He is dismissive of postmodernism, a field that houses a number of thinkers who could have helped Johnson develop his thoughts on urban fear and terror. And he seems, honestly, to think London's past is Sao Paolo's present--that is, that there is little qualitative difference between the two. If I may be so bold, what Johnson could really use is a little less E.O. Wilson and a little more theory coming from the pioneers of Medical History, namely, Charles Rosenberg and Warwick Anderson.

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More than just a disease story

The Ghost Map is at first glance the story of two people showing that cholera is waterborne. While it is that it is also a very interesting commentary on the forces that obstruct new knowledge from being accepted and the role of individuals in the process of scientific discovery.
Steven Johnson's style is interesting, clear and enjoyable to read and his mastery of not just the direct subject of the book but also the surrounding details is both impressive and a pleasure to read. One surprising and very interesting section of the book deals with the impact on cities on the environment and describes some recent thinking in that area.
If you are interested in history, the life of a big city, the future of cities, graphic representation of information, the lives of people in the 19th century or just a good story then I recommend the book to you.

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Wonderful storyteller but with a broken crystal ball perhaps

This was a very well written book about a subject that could cause stomaches to turn. The way the author told the story kept it interesting in spite of the sordid details of the disease and it's ravages on the human body.

Several have commented about the ending of the book where the author takes out his crystal ball and sort of predicts the future of the urban environment, but even that I found fascinating, if not a bit hopeful.

He did touch on the use of fossil fuels, but he seems to think that term only means gasoline ( his mention of New York City being the greenest city on the planet since it's citizens have a low gasoline consumption ) when in fact fossil fuels include, but are not limited to; fuel oil, natural gas, coal, gasoline, diesel and turbine fuels. All of which New Yorkers are huge consumers.

If the cost of energy becomes as expensive as some pessimists suggest, then I think the huge cities will once again become dark, dirty places which will lose huge numbers of citizens.

This book also makes me wonder if 200 years from now algore will be today's Dr. John Snow or Edwin Chadwick in regards to Gullible Warming. My belief is that he and the other Gullible Warming fanatics will be no different than those who subscribed to the "miasma theory of disease" as detailed in this book.

A great read, highly recommended!!

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reviews: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, page 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19

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