Contains clean line drawings and grubby b&w photos. It is not the most interesting or attractive of Dover's many reprints of mission furniture catalogs. But it is cheap!

Very few stones have been left unturned in the research that led to this work. The book is not really written for the casual reader, as it goes into considerable depth on many aspects of the conception, construction, rise and fall, reorganization and the final convoluted spiral into abandonment. Mr. Plachno admits in the introduction that the final product is larger than he would have liked, but that paring it back would have failed to do justice to the railway. Volume I covers the physical plant, primarily the trackage, and is divided into logically cohesive chapters. Volume II is devoted to the actual history and it too is well organized. Volume III, which will contain material on equipment and operations, has been promised for a very long time but for whatever reason is not yet complete. The text of both volumes I and II is well supported with photographs and an occasional map. There is reasonably good coverage of the principal characters of the story, some of whom, e.g. Samuel Insull, are worthy of having a biography on their own and indeed some do. The text does a good job in covering most of the period from 1900 through about 1952. When Mr. Plachno addresses the period after that time, when the CA&E came face to face with the construction of the Congress Street Expressway, the writing becomes harder to understand. This is largely due to the complicated--almost byzantine--manner in which events played themselves out. There is a very important social message in the death of the CA&E. The proximate cause is the loss to the passengers of the one-seat ride. Much more important is the failure of people to work together because there is nothing in it for them. Mr. Plachno's account leads one to the conclusion that, had there not been such unwillingness on the part of the Chicago Democrats to do something for the suburban Republicans of DuPage County, the ending might have turned out very differently. This work is open to criticism for the somewhat large number of style faults, indicating that the proofreaders failed to ferret out overused expressions. Put into perspective, however, these are at worst only a minor nuisance. A greater criticism, from this reviewer at least, is that the epilog is far from complete. Although the CA&E as a corporate entity is now long gone, there is a surprisingly large body of artifacts still around, including the right of way (now the Illinois Prairie Path), several of the buildings, and a substantial part of the equipment. Probably in the interest of not making the history any more lengthy than it already was, the epilog was cut. Nontheless, there is more to be told. Mr. Plachno will provide answers to many questions if and when volume III appears.

Although this work is interesting in that it attempts to flesh out the details of the lives of the Emperor and Empress of Mexico, it's lack of bibliography and any kind of footnotes or end notes makes it very incomplete. Additionally, I was very disappointed to see that the author (perhaps because of his royal connections) failed to even mention the rather horrible manner in which the incapacitated Empress Charlotte's personal fortune was completely looted by her brother King Leopold II to fund his personal posession of the Congo (later taken over by the Belgian State and turned into a Belgian colony).

This is a subject I am interested in. The only reason I gave it two stars was the easy reading. There was a definite bias in favor of Max and Charlotte. Benito Juarez, a decent man at heart was villifed and referred to as "that Indian." Max was also a decent man who meant well. That was the sad part of this story that was left unsaid. If you are looking for a cut and dried "black hats and white hats," you will not get it, except for some of the slime who clung to the Royal couple and convinced him to take Mexico's crown. A crown that in reality, was as thorny as the cactus, eagle and snake of the Mexican flag.
Read Joan Haslip's The Crown of Mexico instead.

Yes, it is true that this book has no footnotes and no bibliography to speak of, and that it is full of rumor and speculation and unanswered questions. As I read along its sometimes insipid prose I said to myself: why do I keep reading? There was only one answer: I seldom fail to finish a book I start. But about the time that Charlotte goes back to Europe this book became exciting to read and began telling me things I had not remembered about the the story from when I read, back in the summer of 1945, Phantom Crown: The Story of Maximilian & Carlota of Mexico, by Bertita Harding, a novel-like telling of the story which really caught me up in those halycon days of my youth. Of course, one would like to know the truth and the source about things like Charlotte's bizarre crashing into the residence of Pope Pius IX, but it must be more or less accurate, can we not think? This is a defective book, but anyone interested in 19th century royalty cannot help but be a bit attracted to what it has to say. Who is Prince George of Greece, does someone know? He could at least have told us who his ancestors were, I would think.

Sure no pretence on the copy which is non existent, but the most disappointing feature is the fact that the images are weak , and in fact in some cases supplied by the hotels; as a result the book looks certainly more like a collection of bad hotel brochures. Why pay good money for that? Not withstanding the fact that it is doubtful whether the author actually visited the hotels. Not my idea of a useful guide. Obviously it is a commercial attempt to copy Hip Hotels, but frankly not worth it. In future I will just stick to the original...

A beautiful look at an exciting niche. It is a thematic coffee table version of cool new online services such as the great "tablethotels.com" which is much more comprehensive.