Rating: 
Summary: Great in many respects
Review:
The drawbacks are that it is way too long, and to bring the reader all those pages and then to end it with a "well, I really don't know what happened to these characters.. who's to know?" is ultimately unsatisfying if not annoying! It does keep you there for all those pages... although at times the author goes a little overboard trying to impress you with his knowledge and facts (too many chapters are not necsry and way too showy... but I give the author credit for keeping the momentum going for..what was it.. 500plus? pages...
Rating: 
Summary: Every bit as entertaining as "The Alienist."
Review: After I had read "The American Century" and found that Kevin Baker was responsible for the bulk of the research on that fine book, I wanted to read his new work of historical fiction, "Dreamland." I'm glad I did. Not since I read Caleb Carr's "The Alienist" a few years ago, have I enjoyed a novel as much as this one. Baker is able to bring the reader nearly to tears as he details the travails of young women trying to make it from day to day in New York, either as workers in one of the sweatshops on the lower east side or, unfortunately as one of the prostitutes every night putting her life in jeapordy in the Tenderloin or on the other mean streets of that heartless, corrupt, and sad, very sad city. The section detailing the days spent in jail by the striking women is especially chilling. The inclusion of Freud and Jung is compelling not so much for the interpretation of their work, but rather for the hint of progress that would be made in the years to come in the field of psychoanalysis. Other critics have harped on their inclusion in this work, but I found their conversations stimulating. How they end up in Dreamland at the end of the book with the other colorful and larger than life characters in this inspired work-Kid Twist, Gyp The Blood, the Mad Carlotta, Esther, Trick the Dwarf, Tim Sullivan-is deliciously presented. I thought that the inclusion of Frances Perkins as the sole upper class liberal fighting vainly with limited success to stem the tide of worker abuse allowed the author to speak through her character and graphically describe the carnage enveloping the poor young ladies of that era. No wonder FDR made her his only Secretary of Labor. I thought it ironic that a scant thirty years after the time of this novel, this same age group of women, imprisoned in 1912 for having the gall to ask for a 54 hour work-week, formed the nucleus of the manufacturing force that produced all the armament that saved our world from tyranny and made it safe for democracy during World War II. It is never fair to give away the ending of a book, and I won't. But, trust me, you'll love it!
Rating: 
Summary: Dream a little Dream of....a plot.
Review: Dreamland is a bit of a paradox for me...I liked it and didn't like it...was intrigued, and bored...so many contradictions, I don't know what to think....Dreamland starts in a dark, hypnotic swirl of smoke, promising shadows and magic...and quickly becomes something else...something more...real. Kid Twist, immigrant and self-appointed savoir of children running free in the streets rescues a dwarf disguised as a newsboy and a a young man in danger of having his back broken by the dreadful Gyp the Blood, extortionist and pimp, by brandishing a shovel which he uses to knock Gyp out cold, and then runs, knowing he has incurred the wrath of a dangerous and powerful enemy. His flight takes him into the arms of...Gyp's sister, Esther...a proud seamstress who is torn between duty to her family and a desire to stand up for herself. Her affair with Kid Twist; carried on in the hindquarters of a Tin Elephant hotel, quickly confirms for Esther her burgeoning womanhood, and the fact that it is time for her to start living as such, despite the protests of her father. Add in an American visit by Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung, plenty of political intrigue, and numerous glimpses into the world of Coney Island at the turn of the 20th century...this novel is chock full of content. So why only four starts? Because throughout the 500+ pages..I failed to find a centralized plot line, other than the danger of Esther and Kid Twist's affair being discovered by her brother. Kevin Baker delivers a very well realized portrait of blue collar people, circus freaks, and Bowery Bullies, but fails to pull all of them together tightly enough to really wow me. Worth the read to explore the world of Coney Island that will never be again....I hope that future novels of Kevin Baker will have a better realized plot.
Rating:
Summary: Wallowing In Grimitude
Review: I thought reading "Dreamland" would be similar to my experience of reading "Ragtime", except on a much more epic scale, given the novel's length and depth. And it was, sort of. "Dreamland" is what you might get if you took "Ragtime" and made all of the characters really vicious and unpleasant. I always thought I was pretty cynical, but "Dreamland" made me feel positively Polyanna-ish. While I enjoyed the impressive amounts of historical detail and Baker's writing style, the author's preoccupation with the cruelties of life at that time seemed almost self-indulgent. Aside from the romance between Esther and Kid Twist, the reader is bombarded with an unrelenting series of scenes of cruelty, violence, horrific sexual abuse and animal torture, I get Baker's point--he's showing realism--life in New York at the turn of the century, and, in fact, in all of America, was harsh and brutal. People were reduced to their most base instincts to survive. But I beg to differ--a truly realstic portrayal would show both sides of human nature. If things were indeed as horrible as "Dreamland" seems to indicate, how did America ever get anywhere? Why didn't we all stay at a just-above-caveman level of development, stabbing and attacking each other for food, money and entertainment?
I think that the plotline that follows Esther through her involvement in bringing unions and improved working conditions to the women in the garment industries is supposed to show that, but I just kept getting mired down in all of the nastiness going on around her to ever feel encouraged or buoyed up. Don't get me wrong--I'm not the kind of reader who wants some sort of "feel good" novel, where everyone bounces happily throrugh life, la la la. But "Dreamland" goes too far in the other direction. It uses violence and cruelty as a bludgeon to the reader's more optimistic sensibilities until nothing is left but exhaustion and despair.
Then, after having plowed through the book, hoping I would come away with themes more meaningful than "life is bad and people are really mean" (I'd use more forceful language here, but then you'd never see this review!), what happens? The author provides us with one of those "fill in the blank" type chapters and lets the reader use his imagination! Huh? Do some characters get married and live happily ever after? Maybe they do! Or do they meet up with more torment and misery in a real-life historic tragedy? They might have! After all, it's just a story! (Though guess which option gets all the rhapsodic detail).
I think I would have used my time more wisely watching the Coney Island documentary on PBS.
Rating:
Summary: Good book but not as great as Gangs of NY.
Review: I bought this book after I finished reading Gangs of NY by Asbury and I was a little disappointed but not mad. The only reason I'm a little disappointed is it wasn't what I was expecting after reading Gangs of NY. This book only focuses on 6 or 7 main players and not the huge bag you read about in Gangs of NY.
It was still a very interesting book that I felt seemed to read more like short stories then history. I found myself very interested in all the subjects of the book except Freud. I don't understand where that fit into timeline of early NY.
The author did keep my interest enough that I still wanted to read everyday until I finished.
It is a long book that reads at average speed.
Rating:
Summary: Not bad, but...
Review: I couldn't make up my mind if it had no plot or too many plots. As a series of character studies or a glimpse into New York City history, it was a great book. I could've done without Jung and Freud visit America, and still am not sure what they added to the story, but I really got caught up in Esther's story. I have seen the "Coney Island" program by Ric Burns that was mentioned in the sources section, and this kept bringing me back to memories of that show.
Rating:
Summary: Not bad, but...
Review: I couldn't make up my mind if it had no plot or too many plots. As a series of character studies or a glimpse into New York City history, it was a great book. I could've done without Jung and Freud visit America, and still am not sure what they added to the story, but I really got caught up in Esther's story. I have seen the "Coney Island" program by Ric Burns that was mentioned in the sources section, and this kept bringing me back to memories of that show.
Rating:
Summary: Very ambitious but ultimately disappointing.
Review: I really wanted to like this book. I'm a glutton for information on old New York and have read a lot about the time period in question: early 20th century New York. Don't get me wrong. There were some terrific plots evolving throughout this book. I loved the character of Esther, the labor organizer who turns her back on her father, a man who richly deserves her disdain. I enjoyed the love affair between Esther and Kid Twist and the fascinating scenes of Coney Island. I never understood before reading this book that the fascination with the jostling rides was the pleasure it gave men and women who were looking for any excuse to engage in inappropirate behavior. There is much to learn from this book which is exquisitly researched. But for every enjoyment, there is a corresponding disappointment. The plot involving Freud and Jung was tedious and inconsequential, at least in my eyes. It could easily have been eliminated with no problem. I know the author would argue vociferously with that because he intended the book to be ambitious and filled with ideas and not just some setpiece full of fluff. Fair enough. But for me, his ambition did not pay off. Sometimes, shorter is better and this book would have benefited with fewer characters. One more note: The author really copped out in the end on the romance between Kid Twist and Esther. Maybe nothing felt right when he was writing the ending but, to delve into every possible historical and emotional detail between these two characters and then to say, "Well, anything could have happened. I'm not sure what did" is one of the biggest copouts I've ever come across in a novel. The reader is very letdown. Given the dark material of this book, it's not like we were expecting a happy ending, just a definitive ending. We were invested .
Rating:
Summary: Disapointing
Review: I was so excited when I found this book. I have always had a fascination for old New York, it's culture and it's people. While some of the parts describing Coney Island and the lower east side were very interesting, the author lost me when he introduced Freud and Jung to this story. I found myself saing "oh please" more than once while reading these parts. If you find this book in your library, take it out. Otherwise you may want to save your money.
Rating:
Summary: New York in microcosm
Review: I've seen several movies and read several books about life in New York around this time, but none of them are as full of life and wonder as Kevin Baker's "Dreamland". Baker's description of turn of the century New York and Brooklyn, as well as the people who populate them, is full of color, intrigue, and emotion. All of the people he describes are fully realized individuals, from Trick the Dwarf and Gyp the Blood (don't you love those names?) down to Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung, who did indeed visit the US around that time for a series of lectures. My personal favorite in Baker's collection of characters is Big Tim Sullivan, one of the high muckety-mucks in New York's Tammany Hall political machine - and boy, does he have character. To be sure, Baker's description of him is full of a lot of the old Irish stereotypes - but you still can't help liking the guy, for the simple reason that his heart is in the right place (well, most of the time, anyway). The only flaw in Baker's tale is his description, toward the end of the book, of the infamous Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire. That lacked much of the emotion and punch of the rest of his story. I'm eagerly looking forward to Baker's next book.
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