This is a great collection of American treasured landmarks and items. It serves as both a historical review and a great presentation piece.

As a 15 year resident of Boston, I was hoping for an engaging, objective read on urban dynamics/dysfunctions but got rather more of a shrill diatribe. One page would contain thoughtful musings and compelling statistics (although just about any statistic can be manipulated to support a given viewpoint) followed by a page of politically correctisms (the one laugh-out-loud moment is when Suarez actually claims he is not PC!) Too many good questions are raised to easily dismiss what is presented here but its angry, insulting tone and over-emphasis on racism almost cancels this out and you are left with a near-wash.

In the opening chapter "WHAT WE LOST" the author sums up the relative soulnessness of suburban vs. urban living in the sentence "The automobile, that ultimate isolator, turned life into a TV show, a mediated set of images seen through the screen of our windshields" (p.20). After having lived for four years in Paris I understand exactly what Mr Suarez is bemoaning when he describes the community and sense of belonging people had in an urban environment, which was lost in the U.S during the "white flight" to the suburbs. In Paris I walked everywhere, knew my neighbours and was surrounded by small businesses, restaurants and cafes, a far cry from the neatly manicured lawns and people empty streets of suburbia, or to use the term coined by Mr Suarez "autosuburbanalia". This is a thought-provoking book that does an excellent job of exploring what was lost in the migration of European Americans and later middle class African Americans to the suburbs, it also contains an excellent analysis of what happened. Where the book failed was it's inability to fully explore the Why part of the equation. Mr Saurez puts the blame for white flight to the suburbs and the subsequent deterioration of inner cities squarely on the shoulders of European American intolerance and racism. The implied thesis of this book is that inner cities deteriorated because integration did not work due to the inability of European Americans to accept their new African American neighbours, in fact towards the end there are several pages devoted to examples of European American racism towards new neighbours of color. Legitimately held fears of African American crime are dismissed in the following manner; "Even if you take into account the statistic that a quarter of all black men are in the criminal justice system - either incarcerated or on parole, or on probation, which is an abnormally high number - that's still three-fourths who are not" (p.77) Mr Saurez paints a pretty damning picture of inner city African Americans despite his best efforts to portray them as innocent victims of economic change, bureaucratic neglect and European American aversion and racism. In fact the author goes one step further and implies that African Americans are justified in their violent attacks on other races: "Interestingly, there were Indians in this drugstore here when I visited just six months ago, now it seems they're gone. You're beginning to see more and more black solidarity, vis-à-vis the Asian and Indian business people, which sometimes spills over into real violence. How does a Kim's Market open, how does it survive in a place like this?"(p.70) Blatant violent racism on the part of African Americans towards other peoples is not condemned by the author, in fact it is referred to uncritically and without shame as an expression of "black solidarity", is it any wonder that non African American's choose to move out to the suburbs? Instead of looking for outside excuses Mr Suarez should show African Americans enough respect to acknowledge that they are responsible for their own destiny and thereby carry the blame for the deterioration and violence of the inner city environment they created and in which they live. Despite my difference of opinion with many of the conclusions in this work I highly recommend it to anyone interested in a stimulating, controversial and educational read.

Do not read this book as a cold analysis of what went wrong inour cities, although you will certainly gain some insight into thecauses of urban decline. Saurez speaks with the voice of many of uswho love much about cities: walking on city sidewalks and waving toneighbors we actually know as they sit on their porches, enjoying thearchitecture of older storefronts where unique non-chain shops stillflourish, and feeling part of a real community.

Other reviewers saySaurez concentrates too much on racism as a cause of the loss of thosecommunities. I think rather he simply reports what he saw and makes noapology for feeling city life offered so much more than living in thenon-places of highways and strip malls and cul-de-sacs with nosidewalks that characterize America's suburbs.

Saurez has written abook that needed to be written.