JULY 2020 - AudioFile
Janina Edwards narrates this globe-trotting and highly informed work in a fluid style. Edwards acts as a tour guide who leads the listener from India to Haiti, London to Manhattan, and skillfully renders the numerous people the listener meets along the journey. Her performance deftly captures the broad interests and wide-angle lens of the author. Mast uses addresses as a magnifying glass to reveal issues of homelessness, identity, and power. Historically, for example, when Queen Maria Teresa in Vienna needed men for her armies, addresses were painted on doors. In twentieth-century Manhattan, developers created “enhanced” addresses, the practice of assigning high-end addresses to buildings in order to raise real estate prices and snob appeal. A.D.M. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine
From the Publisher
"An entertaining quest to trace the origins and implications of the names of the roads on which we reside....The Address Book is [Mask's] first book, and she is already a master at shoehorning in fascinating yet barely germane detours just for kicks....Mask populates her daunting inquiries with a cast of stirring meddlers whose curiosity, outrage and ambition inspire them to confront problems ignored by indifferent bureaucracies." —Sarah Vowell, The New York Times Book Review
"Mask’s fascinating study is filled with insights into how addresses affect ordinary people around the world." —PD Smith, The Guardian (UK)
“A radical treatise on class divisions in a nation that too often insists none exist.”—Bethanne Patrick, Washington Post
"Read Deirdre Mask’s fascinating deep dive into the world of Mill Lane and Martin Luther King Street and you will begin to realise just how important these geographical markers are, how pregnant with meaning, and what a difference they make to everything from the proper functioning of society to questions of wealth, poverty and democracy...Highly entertaining."—Andrew Holgate, The Sunday Times (UK)
“An impressive book-length answer to a question few of us consider: "Why do street addresses matter?" In her first book, Mask combines deep research with skillfully written, memorable anecdotes to illuminate the vast influence of street addresses as well as the negative consequences of not having a fixed address....Throughout this eye-opening book, the author clearly demonstrates that package deliveries constitute a minuscule part of the significance of addresses—not only today, but throughout human history....A standout book of sociological history and current affairs.”—Kirkus Review (starred)
"This is a fascinating volume revealing the racism and classism behind the street names and house numbers of the places in which we live. Deirdre Mask’s impeccable research and memorable stories make for a compelling history.”—Karla Strand, Ms. Magazine
“An entertaining and wide-ranging debut....Mask’s fluid narration and impressive research uncover the importance of an aspect of daily life that most people take for granted, and she profiles a remarkable array of activists, historians, and artists whose work intersects with the evolution and meaning of street addresses. This evocative history casts its subject in a whole new light.”—Publishers Weekly (starred)
“Engaging, illuminating, and with highly relevant current subject matter, this book is recommended for all readers, especially fans of popular history and politics."—Library Journal (starred)
"From her history of the city grid to an on-the-street look at the NGO trying to give every slum in India an address, Mask leaves us with a greater appreciation of our efforts to find each other, and a peek into what the future may hold.”—Booklist
”Deirdre Mask’s book was just up my Strasse, alley, avenue and boulevard. A classic history of nomenclature - loaded, complex and absorbing.”—Simon Garfield, author of On the Map: A Mind Expanding Exploration of How the World Works
“I had hoped The Address Book would change the way I think about an oft-overlooked, seemingly banal bit of everyday life. I had no idea it would so change the way I think about life itself.” —Tom Vanderbilt, author of Traffic and You May Also Like
“The story of our streets is the history of our cities. Deirdre Mask reveals how the tales secreted within a street name can be as mesmerizing and mystifying as the city itself—and the people who call that place home." —Janette Sadik-Khan, Bloomberg Associates, former NYC Department of Transportation Commissioner
“The Address Book is a deeply-researched dive into the surprising histories and meanings that lie behind the seemingly mundane way we name our streets and number our houses and buildings. Deidre Mask provides powerful insight into the ways these addresses not only structure our lives but function as a tool to classify and track people, reflecting the enduring divides of class, race, and power. A must read for urbanists and all those interested in cities and modern economic and social life.” —Richard Florida, author of The Rise of the Creative Class
“Adam Gopnik observes that 'cities are their streets. Streets are not a city’s veins but its neurology, its accumulated intelligence.' In this light, street addresses map not just a city’s geography, but its very thoughts, and even its way of thinking. It is no accident that, in suburban sprawl, most people live on streets that go nowhere, or on parking lots with no proper street addresses at all. In this lively and eye-opening book, Deidre Mask unearths the many layers of meaning hiding just below the surface of the ways we place ourselves and others in our communities.” —Jeff Speck, urban planner and author of Walkable City: How Downtown Can Save America, One Step at a Time.
Library Journal
★ 02/01/2020
As Mask reveals in this debut, the concept of a street address is a marvel of social and political engineering. She starts with a journey through the slums of Kolkata, where she sees for herself the toll that the lack of an address takes on people cut off from the bureaucratic state. Physician John Snow traced the cholera epidemic in London based on a map, but for those in unmapped areas, including parts of Haiti or Liberia, epidemics are impossible to trace. Mask's explorations take her from Ancient Rome, where people could navigate by landmark, to the literal and sordid street names of medieval England and to modern Japan and Korea. Choosing and changing a street name is often the most revealing about the values of a culture. The Netherlands took one week to name a street after Martin Luther King Jr.; Atlanta took eight years. Nazi Germany and apartheid-era South Africa reveal that loss of culture, loss of identity, and loss of psychological comfort can all overlap with the name of a street. VERDICT Engaging, illuminating, and with highly relevant current subject matter, this book is recommended for all readers, especially fans of popular history and politics.—Margaret Heller, Loyola Univ. Chicago Libs.
JULY 2020 - AudioFile
Janina Edwards narrates this globe-trotting and highly informed work in a fluid style. Edwards acts as a tour guide who leads the listener from India to Haiti, London to Manhattan, and skillfully renders the numerous people the listener meets along the journey. Her performance deftly captures the broad interests and wide-angle lens of the author. Mast uses addresses as a magnifying glass to reveal issues of homelessness, identity, and power. Historically, for example, when Queen Maria Teresa in Vienna needed men for her armies, addresses were painted on doors. In twentieth-century Manhattan, developers created “enhanced” addresses, the practice of assigning high-end addresses to buildings in order to raise real estate prices and snob appeal. A.D.M. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Reviews
★ 2020-01-13
An impressive book-length answer to a question few of us consider: "Why do street addresses matter?"
In her first book, Mask, a North Carolina-born, London-based lawyer-turned-writer who has taught at Harvard and the London School of Economics—combines deep research with skillfully written, memorable anecdotes to illuminate the vast influence of street addresses as well as the negative consequences of not having a fixed address. Many readers probably assume that a street address exists primarily to receive mail from the postal office, FedEx, UPS, and other carriers. Throughout this eye-opening book, the author clearly demonstrates that package deliveries constitute a minuscule part of the significance of addresses—not only today, but throughout human history. Venturing as far back as ancient times, Mask explores how the Romans navigated their cities and towns. She describes the many challenges of naming streets in modern-day Kolkata (Calcutta), India, where countless mazes of squalid alleys lack formal addresses. "The lack of addresses," writes the author, "was depriving those living in the slums a chance to get out of them. Without an address, it's nearly impossible to get a bank account"—and the obstacles compound from there. Mask also delves into the controversies in South Africa regarding addresses, issues exacerbated by apartheid and its aftermath. In the U.S., one can track racist undertones via streets named for Confederate icons such as Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson. The author offers insightful commentary regarding the fact that U.S. roadways named for Martin Luther King Jr. are usually found in poverty-stricken urban areas, and she addresses the many problems associated with homelessness. She also explores the dark period of Nazi Germany when street names identified where concentrations of Jews lived, making it easier for them to be rounded up and sent to the death camps. In a chapter prominently featuring Donald Trump, Mask explains the monetary and prestige values of specific addresses in New York City. Other stops on the author's tour include Haiti, London, Vienna, Korea, Japan, Iran, and Berlin.
A standout book of sociological history and current affairs.
