Outside Lies Magic: Regaining History and Awareness in Everyday Places

Outside Lies Magic is like no other book I've read. Written in a flowing, sensuous style, it provides a new way to view the world. Read it, and your life will change

This book is the concentrated essence of a life's work. It shows us that connection is still possible in this disconnected age. It shows us that America's history is not captive in printed pages and tv documentaries, but lives all around in the building and in the pulling down, in the shiny new and in the rusted. Stilgoe does not illuminate the unremarkable, instead he reflects the light that he sees emanating from it. A remarkable achievement. A remarkable book. Highly recommended.

Possibly the most fascinating book I have read since Carl Sagan's "The Dragons of Eden". How often do you read a book that makes you want to get up off your chair (perhaps taking the book with you if you haven't finished yet) and wander off for outside adventures with its tantalizing accounts of what you will find in your neighborhood and town, and their outlying areas?! Stilgoe draws us out into the "real world" page by page in this exploration of the modern world around us, its intriguing history of urban and rural constructions, and what it all means. A great book especially in that once you have read it, it continues giving to you as you take what you have learned from it and go further into the everyday world with it. Talking about this book practically makes me jump up and down with excitement over the possibilities. No, wait -- it's LITERAL! I am, in fact, jumping up and down.

John Stilgoe once again captures the imagination of the reader and encourages us to truly "see", not just "inhabit" the world that lies all around us.As in his other works, he teaches us that history and archaeology are not just a part of musty museums, but of the every day built environment. There is a history behind everything that we come across in our daily lives and he wants us to take a second as a child might and think about the environment in which we live.Having had the opportunity to take classes he taught at Harvard, this book enabled me to reenter his world of delicate insight and deep knowledge about what many in our society simply overlook or have forgotten.If you like pop culture, history, walking down forgotten railroad beds or simply enjoy driving down unknown roads, Stilgoe will capture you.

Though you may get more detailed info on some of the specific subjects covered in this book, the point really is that if you get out on foot or bicycle you can begin to relearn visual acuity. It is not the end all be all guide to the visual landscape but rather a call to arms. Most people wonder at the keen perception demonstrated by observers in previous centuries, Stilgoe spells out why we have lost this and how we may regain it. His chapters are inticements and not academic. For proof of Stilgoe's total mastery of landscape history read any of his previous works. I can't think of a similar book on the market today that addresses the urban landcsape, the everyday and does not romanticize the wilderness "preserves" of the park service. Excellent. Don't read it unless you plan to get off your butt.