Railroad Books

I picked this up off the library shelf, and aside from a few "huh" moments, was not at all bothered that this was third in a series.

This is a mystery, yes, but it is not at all formulaic. The hero of the story, Fever Devlin, a folklorist goth-ish man, doesn't even really solve the mystery, though his logic fu is strong.

The characters are well drawn and the mystery is a good, compelling story. The scenes are drawn well, and one almost feels the air of the Appalachains and tastes the food of the south.

All in all, quite a good story.

(*)>

Phillip Depoy utilizes a fluid and lyrical prose to depict a man whose fractured soul is caught between the realms of his crippling and fairly surreal past and his hauntingly eerie present circumstances. His blending of folkloric legend with the Georgia Appalachian hill-country setting that is backgound to all of his Fever Devilin mysteries results in a tale that is spellbinding and impossible to set down.

Patricia Anne Dennison--author of THE SPELL OF SAINT CYRIL'S CEMETERY and STOP THE VOICES

There are so many different parts of the South, it becomes difficult to create a true picture of the region, but Phillip DePoy's A MINISTER'S GHOST is both accurate and electric as he weaves a twisted tale of suspense.
Fever Delvin is a collector of the tales of his home area in the GA mountains. The death of two young women on a railroad crossing leads Fever on a twisted path to discover the truth before someone else falls victim to a crafty killer. He meets unexpected resistance from his old friend Sheriff Skidmore Needle.
This is our first Fever Devilin, but it will not be the last. The characters are so well drawn and the incidents so believable when you have a friend who established a department of folk literature for a university and live in the Cumberland Mountains.
Nash Black, author of TRAVELERS and SINS OF THE FATHERS.

Depoy's latest work is simply wonderful. Fine characterization, sharp plotting, and engagingly written. Don't miss it!

This book is not for everyone. As a reader, one must open oneself to the local culture, atmosphere and old beliefs of hill people where what's real can have a different definition. The characters include little people, a ghost, a snake-handling preacher, hobos, a junk-yard dealer with a unique musical instrument and Fever's best friend, the sheriff who is not acting like himself. The mystery is not the strength of the story. The strength is the unusual, intriguing characters and atmospheric, lyrical writing. Personally, I very much enjoyed this book and this series and want to find out more about these fascinating people.

My grandfather was a conductor on the railroad and retired about 10 years ago. He is recently widowed and is very lonely. I'm not sure what this book is like or about but he loves the railroad and is always talking about his years on the rails. I would like to know if this book would be a good birthday gift for him next week.

Niemann's quick patter, penetrating heartfelt look at the people around her, and brevity take us on an adventure that caters to my Tom Boy and captures my short attention span. I read it cover to cover in one day, thought about it for days later.

Gritty, dusty, muddy, ballast-strewn dirt under foot. A coppery feeling in the mouth. Eyes strained and burning, almost too tired to open. Perpetual noise---the incessant squeaking, grinding, thumping and crashing of heavy, lumbering machinery. Break time, and the codgers slumping in straight-back chairs leaned against the wall are all snoring, smoking, or describing their latest sexual conquests. Oily, smoky air stinking of hot grease. The feel, smell, look and sound of heavy industry, all the same day after day, night after night. These are the sensations that Niemann and Bertucci's book leaves in the reader's mind.

The title and even the subject matter notwithstanding, I hesitate to categorize this book as a volume on railroading. The impressions of the people and their work-lives that are featured in the prose and the photographs are descriptive of all those who labor in the blue-collar jobs of heavy industry. These railroaders have much in common with miners, steel mill workers, grain elevator operators, truck builders, and all the rest on whom our nation's economy depends.

If we must, because of its focus, speak of it as a railroad book, let us be clear about what it is not: There are no ballads or wreck songs here, no folklore about John Henry or Casey Jones, no heroic histories of rail disasters, no financial analyses or statistics of ton-miles hauled or ruminations on the nostalgic era of steam locomotives. What we really have is a book of contemporary photographs, some taken with film and some painted with the brush of words. Both kinds of photos reveal the grass-roots operating railroader and the real, unembellished, and usually uninspiring environment in which he or she labors.

What is the lasting value of this book? It is truly American sociology and history. Not the history of the corporate board room. Not the history of company economics. Not even the technological history behind roller bearings and the huge diesel-electrics that haul unit trains from Powder River coal fields to the ravenous furnaces of east coast electrical generating plants. The history in this book is both more basic and more essential, for it shows us the working conditions of the people who make the machine run, whose work enables the rail corporations to prosper, and whose personalities are shaped by the unsympathetic and unending tasks set for them.

If, Gentle Reader, you react badly to harsh language, to untempered sexual remarks, or to photos including "explicit" centerfolds taped to a yardman's locker door, then perhaps this book is not destined for your reading list. On the other hand, if you find fascination (or perhaps reminiscence) in unexpurgated portrayals of blue-collar working Americans or if you merely wish to understand the demands of such work and how it shapes the people who perform it, then I believe that you will treasure this book as a most worthy addition to your library. Whether you shelve it with your books on sociology, heavy industry, American history, or transportation will be your call. It integrates them all.

By the way, if you find fulfillment with "Railroad Voices," explore "Set Up Running," a similar exploration into the life of a real, unremarkable railroader, an engineman on the Pennsylvania Railroad. Both books show us the real world of the railroad employee with grease on his (or her) clothes, gloves on his (or her) hand, and a union dues deduction in his (or her) paycheck.

This is one of the best railroad books I have read in my 30+ years in the railroad industry, and I found it difficult to put down. I have shared my copy with my railroad colleagues, including several women, who all said they enjoyed it immensely, and want their own copies.

The two women have a gift for capturing the true essence of our industry. Ms. Niemann writes in the language of the trainmen's locker rooms, switch shanties and locomotive cabs, a mixture of railroad slang and profanity, but, that is the way it really is.

Lina Bertucci's photos truly convey the sense of never-ending fatigue, boredom, grime, that was (is) part of railroading, then and now. (I also had the pleasure of knowing Ms. Bertucci and some of her female co-workers when they became the first women hired by the Milw RR for train service in the '70s. Those women fought some real barriers to be accepted in what had been a all-male environment.)

I've only worked for the railroad for 2 years but reading this book brings back memories of some of my trips. I was going to wait to read this book on the plane but I just couldn't put it down. Once you read the first page, you're hooked and you want to keep reading. The railroad, in a way, is like one big family and this book brings that to the reader.

The book was shipped in the condition described and by the time I needed it.

I Love This Entire Series! The author makes history so interesting. I have enjoyed learning U.S. History all over again (more like for the first time) with my kids. Recommend the whole set!

When I first saw this book, I expected it to be like the awful textbooks found in schools across the country (the ones you could fall asleep reading), but it was nothing like what I had anticipated it being. Joy Hakim's fabulous writing, and the fun facts and illustrations scattered throughout this book make history seem like an ongoing story. Good for kids and adults alike!

This book is really supposed to be for little kids in elementary school, but I am reading it to understand my U.S. history class in high school, because it conveys our history with such clarity, and doesn't muddle things up like big ol' textbooks. SO BUY THIS NOW!You won't regret it...I wish I could have given this book more than 5 stars.

"Reconstructing America 1865-1890," the 7th volume in Joy Hakim's A History of US series, expands the notion of reconstruction, usually applied only to the Southern states of the former Confederacy to include the entire nation. In her preface to the volume Hakim declares "Are We Equal? Are We Kidding?" Her point is to underscore the Declaration of Independence's famous proposition that all men are created equal and to point out that ending slavery does not really free people if they are denied education and jobs. However, while the issue of racial division begins and ends this book, Hakim covers the entire domestic history of the United States in between the Civil War and the rise of the nation as a world power.

This volume does not have a formal structure but you can still find four rather distinction units. The first (Chapters 1-10) talks specifically about Southern Reconstruction and the fight between President Andrew Johnson and Thaddeus Stevens, leader of the Radical Republicans in Congress. The second (Chapters 11-18) tells about the opening of the West and Indians ordered to reservations. The third (Chapters 19-25) contrasts the world of Boss Tweed and Thomas Nast, P.T. Barnum and Mark Twain, with the immigrants who came to both coasts of the country. The fourth (Chapters 26-37) starts with the beginning of the movement towards rights for women and ends with Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. DuBois taking on the Jim Crow laws, with the birth of the Industrial Revolution and its patron saint Thomas Alva Edison in between.

As you can see, this is an inelegant division of these 37 chapters at best. But in the second half of the 19th-century of American history lacks the direction of the first, where the nation was hurdling towards Civil War. The idea that America was indeed reconstructing, or remaking itself, makes sense. However, there is no finality to the story at this point because equality between the sexes and the races are still a half and full century away respectively. One sign of the changing focus of history is that George Armstrong Custer and the Battle of the Little Big Horn is literally a marginal topic while the story of Chief Joseph and the Nez Perce gets an entire chapter.

These volumes are wonderfully illustrated, with historic photographs, paintings, and in this particular volume political cartoons that help bring the period alive. Throughout the book you will find detailed features on subjects such as the first conservationist, John Wesley Powell, and the Route of the Nez Perce in 1877. As always the margins are crammed with notes, definitions, mini-biographies, and choice quotations. For children raised on computers and the Internet it is clear that Hakim is speaking their language, and for parents home schooling their children they will find Hakim to be an active teacher who anticipates questions and concerns from students even when she is writing and book and they are reading it. This is an excellent series of American history textbooks.

I recently received this beautiful color collection on "The Mother Road" Route 66. Having traveled West from Chicago to Kingman AZ in the mid 60's on Route 66 it brought back many memories. It also has left me with strong ambitions to repeat that journey but this time all the way to L.A. Wonderful photography and dialouge by the author. Even if you have never traveled on Route 66 you may very well want to after viewing this book.

This is the best Route 66 book I've ever read. The pictures range from breathtaking to amusing and the writing is fresh and clean. A must have for anyone interested in Route 66.

Any book published as part of an "enthusiast color series" is likely intended to be a coffee-table book. And indeed, Route 66 has lots of pretty pictures, captured beautifully by Jim Luning. But unlike most such fare, this book deserves more than coffee-table placement (or, the pinnacle, bathroom-rack status.)

I know the author, Tim Steil, a friend of mine. So, as one who loves grammar, right from the start I had every incentive to pick at his writing. But, alas, I was disappointed. Finding only the most minor of grammatical errors, I had to concede the fact that Steil has written a really good book. Tim's breezy writing makes the book a quick and easy read, and conveys efficiently so much of their adventure that the reader cannot help but feel as if he were there for much of the ride.

Another plus: it's not preachy, or full of phony nostalgia or contempt for "the evils of progress." I love it this book, and I'm not really even a fan of Route 66.

Luning's pictures are gorgeous. I got to meet him when the two authors did some of their preliminary research on the Chicken Basket, one of the offical Route 66 sites covered early in the book. An unassuming and disarming guy, Luning does not betray that he has a long list of credits. But in the book, Luning cannot hide his talent: a fantastic eye for light and color and balance.

So enjoy the pictures. But realize they will not really come to life until you actually read the text.

Route 66 is what an "enthusiast color series" should be.

Route 66, by Tim Steil, is a trip in present, but a journey back in time. There was a day and age when Route 66 was the heartbeat of the Western half of the United States. Unlike its predecessor the Lincoln Highway, Route 66 was modern road made offering fast travel from Chicago to Los Angeles for both automobiles and trucks. Because of the limitations of vehicles of the 1930's through the early 1960's, the road was lined with repair shops, cafes, motels and scenic wonders that range from simple statues or absurd monuments.

More than any other highway, Route 66 has a history and an allure that never ceases to draw the adventurous to it. These days traveling on Route 66 is sort of like visiting a huge living museum of automobile Americana. Steil, aided by photographer Jim Luning, take the journey and give their vision to this long familiar story. The nice part about this book is that MBI, the publisher, chose to offer it as part of the inexpensive Enthusiast Color Series rather than an expensive coffee table book. You can easily take this book with you for easy reading along the way and without taking up too much space at lunch counter. This was a good choice on their part and is sure to make give this book a long sales life.

The author is accurate in his descriptions and the photographer's keen eye caught quite a few features of Route 66 that have not appeared in other publications. Truckers are big part of this story, in fact the famous Dixie Truckers Home in central Illinois gets good coverage right in the beginning of the book. If the lore and legends of Route 66 are already part of your life, or you would just like a low-cost introduction to this famous highway then Route 66, by Tim Steil is a must have item.
- Gary Bricken

Probably the best book to date on the subject, Route 66 is a joy from beginning to end. Referred to affectionately as The Mother Road, Route 66 was the first highway built for high speed travel in the United States. Due to the reliability of the cars and trucks using this road, it was lined with repair shops, diners, and tourist traps. The photography is excellent and the text is insightful and well written. Travelling from Chicago to Los Angeles via this book is a joy!

5 year old boys love this book and since they won't get bored, it helps them learn to read.

This is a wonderful story with great artwork. Sure to please the train lover.

Perfect reading for my two year old grandson who is fascinated with trains!

After reading this book, our 3 year old can name every type of rail car. We live near a busy line and he is quite fond of calling out the types of cars he sees.

We thought our 4 yr old train fanatic had taught us everything we needed to know about all the different train cars, but this book had a lot more knowledge for us. It's one of his favorite books, and has large photographs of trains and train cars. I think this is a must-have for any train loving kid!

My daughter loves trains, so I bought this lovely picture book for her. She has me read it to her all the time! It has lots of interesting stuff about trains and the history of locomotives without being overly wordy. I think she especially likes that the greatgrandmother of the narrator was an engineer in the 30's.

This is a beautiful book. My 3 y.o. train crazy son LOVES it. My 8 y.o. daughter, not such a train lover, really ejoyed it too. She keeps wanting to get in on my son's bed at story time to hear it over and over. I have even learned a few things. Beautiful illustrations. I highly recommend this to anyone who has a train or history lover.

When my son found this book at the local library, I couldn't wait to write a gushing review. I am really delighted with this book. The more we read it together, the more impressed I am with the author and illustrator.

This book is organized so that you go back in time, viewing the trains of earlier and earlier generations. (This is much more interesting than it sounds. Stay with me!) The narrator is a boy who says that when he goes up, he wants to drive a train like his dad. Then we hear about how his dad also wanted to be an engineer because that is what HIS father was, and so forth. We are brought back in time all the way to the earliest American trains (and the boy's great great great great great grandfather--kids love the repetition too). The final scene is a futuristic train that the boy imagines driving when he grows up.

Every other page spread on the book contains short text about a child wanting to drive trains like his father (or mother in one case!) and a gorgeous illustration of a train. If you look carefully, you'll see that every scene is shown from the exact same vantage point, with the same mountains in the background. Not only do the trains change, but so do the stations, the tracks, and the buildings around them. The illustration style is lush, and every one of these images features a different cat somewhere in the scene. My son loves to search for them.

The alternating page spreads contain extended text and additional images about the era of train history depicted on the previous page. I have read many, many books on trains because my son gobbles up anything we can find on them, and yet I learned many new things from this book. For instance, did you know that when multiple engines are used to pull a train, they are called a "consist"? Or that brakemen on old trains had to run along the tops of the cars to set the brakes on each one manually? The level of detail is not a whole lot greater than most other non-fiction train books for kids, but it seems to find the most unique and telling details.

I would recommend this book for any train child ages 3 and up. You won't mind reading this one over and over. For younger children, just read the text on alternating pages and the captions of the pictures on the more detailed sections.

This a great story of the history of trains as seen through the eyes of a family of engineers. Well written and the artwork is fantastic. A recommended read.

My little newphew loves, loves trains. At this time this is his favorite train book. We read only every other page. The other pages are to long, but he loves it. And I like the theme of the story.

A marvelous book, extremely well written with accurate detail and and hundreds of wonderful street scene photos on virtually every page. Book is worth twice the price.

Fascinating book for a boy who lived in St.Paul from 1928 until 1951. Great pictures,maps and text. A real joy.

What a great book!! John Diers and Aaron Isaacs have given transit fans and Twin Cities historians an in depth look into the horsecar, cablecar, and streetcar era in our towns. I knew that there were horsecars in the Twin Cities, but did not know about the cablecars. In 1953 and 1954, my aunt took my on several streetcars routes prior to their abandonment. About 1960, I joined the Minnesota Transportation Museum and helped restore the TCRT 1300--the car that runs in Linden Hills. Both Mr. Diers and Mr. Isaacs are involved with that streetcar museum. My goal this summer is to have both authors autograph my book.

I wish they would have had a short chapter on the Hiawatha Light Rail line to complete rail transit history for the Twin Cities.

As information, Aaron Isaacs late father (George) was very instrumental in getting the Hiawatha Light Rail line for the Minneapolis area.

Ed Burns of Anoka

This is a wonderful book. The pictures are amazing. We actually found a picture of my husband's Grandfather, George, that worked on the Lake Steet line.

Unlike many streetcar histories that assume that the reader already has a familiarity with at least the geography or operation of the traction company being presented, the authors of this book combine a creative layout and numerous maps with a discussion of all aspects of Minneapolis/St. Paul streetcar operations that can be easily grasped by non-Twin Citians. The maps are the best that I have ever seen, especially the individual route maps that show each street along with dates of the start and end of service on each segment. The book has a rich, "coffee-table" appearance that invites picking it up for frequent browsing, and the nicely reproduced black and white photographs and well-written text amply reward the effort.

I consider myself an expert on Disneyland; I'm a former Imagineer and a collector of Disneyland information. Michael Broggie is not exaggerating his father's importance to the realization of Walt's dream. This book goes slightly beyond the sanitized "official" version that the Disney company promulgates and includes some stories and details that haven't been widely known. It's a beautiful coffee table book, complete and accurate (except for one or two nits someone like me might pick). I love it particularly for all the never-before published photos--you get so tired of seeing the same old approved shots when you collect Disneylandiana.

In case Amazon doesn't provide links, I would also recommend "Walt Disney Imagineering" by David Mumford, et.al. and "Inside Story" by the late Randy Bright. Both are "official," but just as authoritative as Broggie's.

Having been a "Walk in Walt's Footsteps" tour guide at Disneyland AND an engineer on the Steam Trains, I can say with full confidence that this is THE best book written about Walt Disney and his vision of Disneyland, and his love of trains.

The photographs are outstanding, the writing is wonderful, interesting, and easy to read, and the the stories, history, and facts are amazing.

Buy this book for yourself, and get an extra copy to give to someone who likes Disney - they'll be very thankful!

I have always loved the trains at Disneyland more than any other attraction. I always had dozens of questons about the trains that I wished I could get answers to. When I found out about this book I ordered it immediately. (My first experince with "one-click" ordering by the way, and WOW how easy!!) The book arrived on a Friday and I sat down to read it as soon as I got home from work. I could not put it down! I read straight through until 4am the next morning and finished it. It answered all the questions I ever had about the trains at Disneyland. It is a wonderful glimpse into the life of Walt Disney, and the group of incredibly talented people who worked for him. If you love trains, this book is a must. If you love Disneyland, this book is a must. If you could care less about trains and Disneyland, but you love a good story, this book is a must. Thank you Michael Broggie, for sharing this wonderful story.

I normally only read technical books. I picked this book up just to look at the pictures. Then I started to read the short articles within the chapters. I found them so fasinating that I found myself reading the main articles. My son asked my wife "what is Dad doing reading?". Walt Disney said that it all started with a mouse, but after reading this book you will realize that it all started with a train.

As a backyard railroader for the last 30 years, I had always wanted to find out more about Walt Disney's backyard, the "Carolwood Pacific". Now in "Walt Disney's Railroad Story", you can read about all of his interest in railroading, first building a miniature railroad in his backyard, and finally developing theme parks, complete with railroads. Author Broggie knew Walt personally, and covers all of the details of the many Disney railroads. This is one book that I could hardly put down until I had read it completely. I feel that this is a book that should be on the shelf of every backyard railroader and most Disney fans.

This book offers a chance to journey back to the golden age of American rail travel (and model electric trains) against the backdrop of Christmas remembered and re-imagined. Beautifully illustrated and designed, gracefully written, and charming in every respect. A delightful time machine for anyone wanting to go back to Christmas Past, bring it forward into the present, or simply make that festive season last just a little longer.

I am nowhere near being a "train buff" besides admiring the odd model train layout and having ridden commuter trains, but this book is absolutely fabulous. The stories about working on the railroad at Christmas, or riding the train at Christmas, and other train related holiday memories are well-written and make you want to go back to those days. The paintings of trains in the snow are superb and it's great to read those wonderful old advertisements.

What a charming, evocative look at the way Christmases used to be -- people bustling home for the holidays, filled with brightly-colored packages and good cheer, alighting from Pullman cars at snowbound New England railroad stations. Today, we order our products online, grouse about the holiday traffic on choked Interstate highways, and suffer the indignities of overcrowded airports (anyone reading this try to get home for Christmas 2005 via ComAir or US Airways?). I think one of the reasons why we remember the Christmases past of the 1940's and 1950's so fondly is that people remained grounded to the concept of "going home" ... and the chief way they returned home was by being "grounded" to the rails, where an appreciation can be gained for the American landscape, cultural and linguistic differences, and regional distinctiveness. Today, our "big box" stores at a shopping mall in Maine appear little different than those in New Mexico. Yet there was a era when Christmas was simpler, purer, and -- I believe -- more genuine. This simple volume will take you there. I particularly enjoyed the childhood recollections of overnight journeys aboard Pullmans through the snowbound Vermont countryside and the poignant stories of Servicemen who spent their holidays on troop trains. This book seems destined to become a minor holiday classic -- for all of us who still believe in the essential double magic of Christmas and a train trip.

Author Jennison has accumulated many pictures and short tales about Christmas and trains, both toy and real trains. Artistic depictions of railroads in winter and during the holiday season are intermixed with many advertisements that lured customers to the trains at Christmas throughout the 20th Century. Most amazing of all, however, is the text, which is filled with stories about individual's love affairs with trains. I never dreamed that the Lionel train that came out every holiday at my home had such a rich history. If you were enchanted by the Polar Express, you will probably be taken by the many less fantastic stories of Christmas trains that Jennison has accumulated, each of which produced images for the participants as fantastic as any in the Van Allsburg book or the current movie...and the art reproduced in the volume will stimulate many to imagine their own train movies in their mind. A great book for getting in the Christmas mood.

I purchased this book not realizing that it was devoted entirely to trains (both model trains and actual trains) and their relation to Christmas. Now that I'm aware of what this book is, I find it to be a wonderfully sentimental book. (And that is a positive statement!) However, I will be honest and say that those who have no interests in trains (toy or otherwise) would most likely have no interest in it and would probably want to pass on it.

My 3 year old son loves this book. We read this book just about every night. It combines the two things he loves most with a hobby he loves more. That would be TRAINS and DINOSAURS and READING. This book never gets old for him. He loves to point out what is going on in the illustrations,which are beautifully done.The expressions of the dinosaurs are so amusing. We currently have this in a paperback but will be ordering the hardback to add to his collection.

This is such a fun book. My little guy loves dinosaurs and we read this book over and over again. Great pictures and a fun, fun, fun story. Love to see more dino books from Ms. Lund.

Deb Lund and Howard Fine have created another humorous ride that is as fun to read aloud as it is to look at. Deb Lund's playful poetic language makes it a book that we will enjoy for years. More please!

I have two young sons, as well as a baby daughter. My sons are obsessed with, respectively, dinosaurs and trains. So now I have a book that can satisfy both of them when they are on my lap and begging for a book. I must not be the only dad in this situation, since there are a few picturebooks about dinosairs on trains.

Before becoming a dad, it had never occured to me that there was a pressing need for books that combined paleobiology with locomotive transport. Who knew? But this is the best of the lot, and I still have not become bored with it. Given how many times I have now read it, that is the strongest recommendation I can give a children's book. If you are a parent, you know what I mean.

A train trip inspired Deb Lund to write All Aboard the Dinotrain. Howard Fine has illustrated fourteen books (give or take a few) according to his count.

Written in whimsical rhyme, All Aboard the Dinotrain takes children on an exciting Dinotrain trip. The cargo is loaded, the coal is stoked, the whistle blows and off the dinos go on their train adventure.

They go up steep hills and through dark tunnels. The cars tip left and right but the dinos all lean way out and hang on tight. And when the train won't stop, danger is near. The trestle is out and all of the dinos fear for their safety.

What will happen when the train comes to the end of the line? Will the train go into the water? Will the dinos be saved? Whew! If they get out alive they won't ever take another train trip. But how will they travel? All Aboard the Dinotrain will give children all the answers and a lot of fun reading the adventures of the dinotrain.

Armchair interviews says: All Aboard the Dinotrain is a rollicking good ride and children will enjoy reading it again and again.