James Mauro

Well, this book turned out to be a bust. It had a couple of highlights, but very few. From the title and dust jacket art, I thought this would be similar to Erik Larson’s “Devil in the White City.”

On one hand it was. Lots of details about the building and execution of the 1939 World’s Fair in New York. One of the more interesting details that I learned was about its location. Out in Flushing Meadow in the Queens Borough, there was a trash dump. The men behind the fair had it filled in and it became the fairgrounds.

I had hoped to get a glimpse of the genius (considering Albert Einstein is on the cover), and I guess there was some of that…how the technology worked. The Madness stemmed from its president, Grover Whalen, who seemed just a tad OCD. As for the murder, during the second half of the fair, there was a problem with bombings. However, none of how the bombs were found, the destruction they caused or those who lost their lives even began until page 290.

Twilight at the World of Tomorrow gets 1 out of 5 stars in Julie’s world.… (mais)

In Twilight at the World of Tomorrow: Genius, Madness, and the 1939 World's Fair on the Brink of War author James Mauro tells the story of the lofty goals and the ultimate disappointment of the 1939-1940 New York World's Fair with verve and healthy doses of engaging anecdotes and vivid detail. To add both texture and context, he gallantly attemps to interweave subplots of Albert Einstein's suggestion to build atomic weapons and a bombing which occurred at Fair's British Pavilion. But these elements are never tightly woven into the narrative, feeling somehow superfluous despite the backdrop of Nazi invasions across Europe and the brewing World War. The rather hasty and abrupt ending, which fails to tie it all together, seems an admission that the author has missed his mark. Nevertheless, this is an enjoyable read for its colorful account of perhaps the most fondly remembered World's Fair.… (mais)