'A delightful compendium of the strangest places on the planet.'
DAILY TELEGRAPH
Travel in search of the obscure and bizarre, the beautiful and arcane in a unique atlas showing the modern world from surprising new vantage points.
Discover the macabre Island of Dolls. Wonder at San Juan Parangaricutiro's church tower, the sole survivor in a town sunk by lava. Explore Beijing and Berlin's labyrinths, home to both refugees and espionage. Marvel at nature's own extraordinary masterpieces: the magical underground river shaped like a dragon's mouth in the Philippines and Palmerston, a floating world.
The truths and myths behind these hidden lairs, forgotten cities and improbable wonders are as varied and intriguing as the destinations themselves. Acclaimed author and social commentator Travis Elborough is a marvellous travel guide to the world's most unusual corners on this fascinating voyage through geography, taking travel writing to new heights.
'This engrossing book traverses the heights and depths, the beauty and terror, of our world.'
THE OBSERVER
'Understatedly expressive'
NEW YORK TIMES
'Deeply researched - and really worth your time'GQ
Rezensionen / Stimmen
" 'A compendium of unlikely, curious and plain odd locales' seems something of a natural habitat for Travis Elborough, a cultural historian with a touch of the Betjemans and a lick of the Meades about him. From deserted mining towns in Nagasaki to the ever-decreasing Holland Island in Maryland, he and cartographer Horsfield do us a great service: making the world feel bigger."
* Monocle magazine * "If you are one of those people whose mind is beginning to wander long before the bread sauce has gone cold, there should be only one book on your Christmas wish list this year... Atlas of Improbable Places by Travis Elborough and Alan Horsfield has that rare, through-the-wardrobe quality. It is a delightful compendium of the strangest places on the planet..." * Daily Telegraph * "non-formulaic, deeply researched - and really worth your time. Co-author and cartographer Alan Horsfield brings a scientific rigour to its scope and design."
-- The Book Club * GQ magazine * "This is a deliciously gloomy, sometimes spooky and often kooky collection of essays..."
* The Age, Australia * "The author makes a witty and well-informed guide to some of the world's most curious and bizarre locations."
* World of Cruising magazine * "With its identical towns, global corporations and digital landscapes, the modern world can seem quite uninspiring. But, for the British author Travis Elborough, interesting places do exist, you just need a way to find them."
* Jocks & Nerds * "informative and enthusiastic, scholarly and amusing....once started it's nigh on impossible to put down." * Hackney Citizen * "an elegant, atmospheric remedy for creeping world-weariness."
* The Lady * "Elborough's worldwide search for the curious, the surprising, the forgotten gems or the just plain eccentric is complemented splendidly by Horsfield's impeccable maps of those places that are so far off the beaten track that their very existence is virtually unknown - or even officially restricted. ...a worthy addition to any bookshelf, coffee table or E-reader..."
* Aga Living * "Atlas of Improbable Places: A Journey to the World's Most Unusual Corners by Travis Elborough, with maps by Alan Horsfield, is a curated guide to places that just don't quite make sense. Elborough organized the book by theme- "Dream Creations," "Floating Worlds," "Otherworldly Spaces," and more- rather than geography, which makes it easy to decide what genre of oddity or improbability you want to consider based on your mood. The large black and white photographs, coupled with beautifully simple maps, gives this book an air of sophistication and inspires more than a little awe."
* Book Riot * "this engrossing book traverses the heights and depths, the beauty and terror, of our world." * The Observer * "Guaranteed to whet the appetite of all budding urban explorers and teenagers wondering where to go on their gap year." * Metro * "The photos are a treasure trove. The paper is divine. Travis Elborough's writing is sublime, and the cartographic skills of Alan Horsfield make this a gift you will not want to part with. So buy yourself something nice this Christmas. * DJ Magazine *
Reihe
Sprache
Verlagsort
Verlagsgruppe
Produkt-Hinweis
Illustrationen
Maße
Höhe: 126 mm
Breite: 196 mm
Dicke: 19 mm
Gewicht
ISBN-13
978-0-7112-6401-4 (9780711264014)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Klassifikation
Travis Elborough is an author and social commentator. His books include the four titles in the Unexpected Atlases series - Atlas of Improbable Places, Atlas of the Unexpected, Atlas of Vanishing Places and Atlas of Forgotten Places, together with A Traveller's Year, A London Year, The Long-Player Goodbye, Being A Writer and A Walk in the Park: The Life and Times of a People's Institution. Travis is a regular contributor to Radio 4 and the Guardian, and has penned articles on all aspects of travel and culture, from pirates in the Caribbean to donkeys at the British seaside. He has written for the Times, Sunday Times, New Statesman, BBC History Magazine and Kinfolk among others. Travis was the winner of the Edward Stanford Travel Book Award in 2020.
DREAM CREATIONS
FLEVOPOLDER
The region reclaimed from the sea
ZHELEZNOGORSK
Former closed Soviet city
FREE CHRISTIANIA
Squatter-city
AUROVILLE
1960s utopian city
SLAB CITY
The squatter metropolis
PORTMEIRION
The Village
ZVYOZDNY GORODOK
Star City
HEARST CASTLE
Randolph Hearst's Xanadu-esque home
DESERTED DESTINATIONS
TEUFELSBERG
Abandoned U.S. spy station
PRESIDIO MODELO
Cuba's most notorious former penitentiary
BATTLESHIP ISLAND
Deserted mining settlement
NO MAN'S LAND FORT
A long shunned coastal bulwark
THE LOST CITY OF SAN JUAN PARANGARICUTIRO
Abandoned after the eruption of 1943
HUMBERSTONE AND SANTA LAURA
Redundant saltpetre works
WONDERLAND
Abandoned Disneyland-style theme park
ORADOUR-SUR-GLANE
Village left abandoned since the Second World War
MUYNAK
Drained port
WITTENOOM
Asbestos-ridden industrial town
ANI, KARS
Ruins of one-time capital of the Armenian Empire
CONCRETE CITY
Garden city of the anthracite region
VAROSHA
Abandoned tourist resort
ARCHITECTURAL ODDITIES
MARYHILL STONEHENGE
Concrete Stonehenge
SPIJKENISSE
The 'real' fictional euro bridges
KABAYAN
The Ibaloi mummy caves
SANTURIO MADONNA DELLA CORONA
Chapel hangs midway down a sheer cliffside
LONDON BRIDGE, LAKE HAVASU
The 1831 London Bridge
THE AFRICAN RENAISSANCE MONUMENT
Controversial symbol of independence
TEN COMMANDMENTS MOUNTAIN
The Fields of the Wood
FLOATING WORLDS
THE PALM 105
An artificial island paradise
THE KINGDOM OF REDONDA
Uninhabited Caribbean island
POVEGLIA ISLAND
Former plague quarantine island
GREAT BLASKET
Uninhabited since 1954
HOLLAND ISLAND
Island slowly being eroded by the water
PALMERSTON
A community formed in its founder's image
WRANGEL ISLAND
A place frozen in time
MOUNT RORAIMA
The Lost World
ROSS ISLAND
British Indian penal settlement
HIRTA
The Edge of the World
OTHERWORLDLY SPACES
AOKIGAHARA
The Demon Forest
COLMA
City of the dead
LEAP CASTLE
The world's most haunted residence
DARVAZA CRATER
Door to Hell
THE HILL OF CROSSES
Home to some 100,000 crosses
THE ISLAND OF DOLLS
A terrifying attraction
SUBTERRANEAN REALMS
THE UNDERGROUND POSTAL RAILWAY
Rail Mail
COLD WAR SPY TUNNEL
The telephone tapping centre
BEIJING UNDERGROUND
Bunkers to beat the bomb
MOOSE JAW
Illicit tunnels
CINCINNATI
Abandoned subway
ZKP TAGANSKY, AKA BUNKER 42
Cold War communications bunker
PUERTO PRINCESA
Subterranean river