Nothing Like It In the World : The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad 1863-1869

Alltogether an excellent read!


Ambrose derails his plans for a good book   March 8, 2002
 6 out of 6 found this review helpful

Having read much of Mr. Ambrose's considerable body of work, it is clear that deadlines and publishers are driving his activities today. "Assistants" are probably not making things better. He certainly is talented and capable ("Undaunted Courage" is my favorite), but this book is a complete failure. It's very popular due to the name on the cover, which says quite a bit about how books are sold.

As noted in other reviews, the "facts" and the writing are uneven and, in some cases, just plain wrong. It appears that several people are coming at the topic from different places. The frustrating experience reminded me of reading the careless Washington and Jefferson biographies written by Willard Stern Randall.

The bottom line for anyone looking at this topic: do not buy this book. Instead, order "Empire Express". It is a serious, well-organized and extremely well-written history worthy of the topic.


Pretty Good All In All   March 6, 2002
 0 out of 2 found this review helpful

I recently discovered the brilliant writings of David Mccullough. Of course, I do understand that this is not one of his books. Here's my point, starting with "A Path Between the Seas" and most recently " Mornings on Horseback" I have become an avid fan of his writing. My enthusiasm for his writing style was raised after reading "Nothing Like it in the World".

While the subject of Ambrose's book was awe-inspiring, I found his writing style to be somewhat disjointed and, at times, redundant. There were many moments in the book that I will remember for a long time, but, for many of these moments, it was because of the subject matter, rather than the telling. I very much appreciate an author's ability to tell a tale with fluidity and style.

It was clear he did an abundant amount of research and dug up great bits of detail on this matter, but because the book lacked a central character throughout its telling, I never felt completely absorbed into the book. For the most part the story of the building of the trans-continental rail rolled along at a fair clip. It's just that with Mccullough's books I find myself ennthralled with the people whose ideas and muscle and industry changed the course of history and his writing has an almost poetic rhythym to it. Whereas in "Nothing Like it" I never felt that same aesthetic pacing that you get from a really good book.

I am going to read Ambrose's Lewis and Clark book for I feel the focus of the book will remain evident throughout the book and I will see a very human side to the story.

Having said all that, I would definitely recommend "Nothing Like it in the World" to readers of this genre. For the book tells an amazing tale of an amazing feat. I would also encourage anyone reading this who has not read Mccullough to search him out and read him.


A struggle to finish; frustrating!   February 25, 2002
 3 out of 3 found this review helpful

This book is a seeming hodge-podge of information, a narrative so sluggish I had a hard time getting through it, despite my interest in the topic. Then to top it off, I ran into a paragraph on page 332 which begins "By February 29..." We're talking about the year 1869 here, which was not a leap year as far as I can tell. But that's not my complaint. The content of the paragraph refers to the "Humboldt Wells", which he also refers to as "the Wells" elsewhere in the narrative. Hmm... "..40 miles east of..." and "...almost into Utah...". Wait a minute! Checking back once again to his Nevada map I note that the place labeled "Wells" is nowhere near the Utah border. In fact, I find after checking a modern map that there is a town called Wells relatively near the Utah border while rhe locale labelled "Wells" on Ambrose's map is approximately near a town called "Humboldt"! Was Ambrose as confused about this as he led me to be? Humboldt Wells is mentioned many times before this, and as paged back and forth through the book during the duration of my reading, trying to tie the narrative to the maps, no wonder I was not enlightened. The maps also label locales never mentioned in the narrative and do not show a number of locales that are. For the information I gained, two stars, but I wish I had found a better book to read about this particular subject.