Mixed Feelings!

This book presents a somewhat uneasy sequence of a discussion on suburbs as a cultural phenomenon and a personal nostalgic memoir on the same topic.

The cultural analysis is quite critical and impressively rich. It touches film, music, television and fiction with wide-ranging references. Regarding cinema, for instance, they go from “The Swimmer” to “Back to the Future” to “Ladybird”.

The latter portion of the book is more emotional than rational. The author, now a thirty-something city dweller, looks back fondly to the time he spent in malls as a teenager and foresees that the Internet will prevent coming generations from experiencing the same. Seeing that suburbia houses a growingly diverse population … and that there are ecological substitutes to lawns, he concludes that suburbs are in the end a positive occurrence.

Strangely, the notion of density is not developed in the book. There is not even a hint that lack thereof may have a direct link to the reduced social interactions and the paucity of public transit that the author laments. Why did he not consult any urban planners, either in person or through their writings?

On another level, editing could have been more meticulous. It is surprising for example to see the verb “conjugate” used instead of “congregate” (in two very separate instances) or to have a “white picket fence all around the fence”.

Overall, this work is truly fascinating in its first part but sadly half-baked in its concluding chapters.

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