Customer Reviews

Invisible Frontier: Exploring the Tunnels, Ruins, and Rooftops of Hidden New York

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

This book was a tremendous disappointment. Many of the "missions" are laughably boring and/or carried out in a stunningly inept fashion, much of the writing is markedly narcissistic in its tone and yet inconsistent in content, and perhaps most disappointing the descriptions of the places where the authors go are remarkably poor.

First, the missions. The mission to the UN mostly involves trying to get inside by asking for an interview. Wow, it's like working for my high school newspaper all over again. Once they're shot down, one member of the team briefly sprints past a barrier and `explores' a plaza outside the building for less than a minute (the main point of which is to hold up the Jinx flag while his friends take his picture). Another involves staying on the subway even after the conductor announces passengers should get off! - oh the bravery and cunning!. This is made all the more ridiculous when two non-English speaking tourists inadvertently do the same thing and when the authors do not even get off the train once it's stopped at the abandoned subway station they had planned to explore. Later, they go into an abandoned house, where they discover that a lot of other people have also done this over the years.

Second, the writing. Much of the text focuses on how cool they look in their "uniforms" (dark suits and sunglasses), how cool they look walking to their missions, how cool they look on their missions, how cool it is when they all get together and how everybody else in New York are mindless zombies who don't appreciate what is around them because they are trapped in their sad, meaningless lives. The whole uniform thing is particularly stupid. There's one throw-away sentence explaining that they wear these uniforms because otherwise "scientists" and "philosophers" will not take their "empirical data" seriously, but you simply can't shake the feeling that they just want to look like they're either in "Reservoir Dogs" or "The Matrix" (particularly when the ridiculous `uniforms' keep attracting attention when they're trying to sneak into some place.) Throughout the book the authors bounce between stressing that they explore places for the scientific, empirical value of doing so and that it is not at all for a sense of adventure, only then to talk later about how much fun the adventure of it all is (including one author's admission that he believes the other has a death wish and that is why he engages in so many dangerous activities while exploring). In addition, much space is taken up with various diatribes on the evils of modern life (including a particularly passionate rant against the United Nations that comes totally out of nowhere), and all the horrible twenty-somethings of the world who spend their lives drinking iced coffees (which is a particularly hollow complaint when - a few pages later - the Jinx crew sits down to iced coffees after having screwed up the UN mission). You almost get the sense that after trying in vain to improve the writing, the publishers finally decided to spin the writing as "witty" and hope that people fell for it.

Finally, the descriptions are no better than what you'd get if you wrote down what you think the locations look like without ever actually going. The Croton Aqueduct is dark and slippery. An abandoned subway station is eerie. When you're on top of the George Washington Bridge, the Hudson River looks a long way away. And that's about as good as the descriptions get.

Don't waste your time or your money.

I was so excited to receive this book, and can not believe how dissapointing it is!! The people aren't urban explorers (UErs for short) - they are children who dress up in costumes and give each other "gang" names and then proceed to perform daredevil-like stunts which are not very impressive.

The book starts out talking about two of the teams failures - City Hall Place and the Croton Acqueduct, which makes you want to put it down and watch grass grow instead. I've been past City Hall Station many times on the downtown 6 train, even with my Mother, it barely even qualifies as daredevil. Their train stops while looping through the station and they are standing right there, but decide not to jump off - don't write a book about it then!! Croton acqueduct is equally as sad - they walk through the tunnels for hours, then stop before the actual bridge (the goal) because they are tired - go back the next day and do it right, or don't write a book about it!!

Any yes, there are no pictures, although they refer to their pictures all the time.

The writing is pretentious and annoying and pointless for the most part - I want to read about "Exploring the Tunnels, Ruins, and Rooftops of Hidden New York" not about your evening spent in twin donuts looking like freaks and scaring people!!

Do yourself a favor and don't buy this book - there are better books about urban exploration, particularly ones about the NYC area.

If the writing and adventures could match the inflated perceptions that the authors have of themselves, this would be a great read. Unfortunately, the writing is downright pedestrian and the urban adventures are either lackluster and/or poorly described. Also, the flow of each chapter is interrupted with uninteresting asides and juvenile commentaries on a scattershot laundry list of topics.

A typical example of this is the uninspiring breakin of an abandoned Harlem row house. The author starts off with a truncated textbook-like history of Harlem that lasts a few paragraphs. Once that boring bit of exposition is done with the writer and his friends drive around a little bit and then enter an abandoned building. They look around a little bit (not exactly thrilling) and then attempt to leave via the fire escape. Here, we are presented with a another aside about the author's 'love' of fire escapes.. "What, in fire escapes, do I admire?... their constancy... firm as Gibraltar... like Ulysses to his barque.. supporting, as Atlas, the gravid snows of winter". Ugh, at times like this you wish the author would have consulted with an editor.

Not everything is terrible. Things pick up here and there, there are a few interesting tid-bits of history, but overall the book does not live up to it's potential.

Very interesting subject; wish authors had provided more substance. Very disappointed with lack of photos especially with constant reminder of photographers who were amongst group of explorers. I too also have my doubts regarding editors/publisher of this book.

Would NOT recommend purchasing.

Lefty Leibowitz and LB Deyo, the writers of this great adventure book, are amazing eccentrics in the underground world of urban exploration. This book made me look at New York City in a whole new light. For anyone that loves the bizarre, the intellectual and the adventurous this is the book!! I read about them in the New York Times, picked up the book and then could not put it down. I do not know where these real life characters came from, but I am glad their likes are prowling about the cities of the world recording decaying history.

A very cool book. If you're into urban exploration or if you are just excited about the idea of climbing bridges, getting onto rooftops, finding underground tunnels etc. then this is right up your alley.

It's all in NYC and the book is basically a compilation of stories of different "missions," including trips to subway tunnels, the top of the George Washington Bridge, the top of the Queensboro bridge, a couple of abandoned buildings, and a water tunnel. The info on getting in places isn't always specific enough to be able to follow it to get into the same place-- this is an adventure book, not a guidebook-- but at least you know from this book that it CAN be done, if you have the guts, and you might be able to pick up some pretty good ideas.

The stories are full of NYC history and bits of philosophy, the whole thing gives you the impression of an indiana jones adventure as written by E.L. Doctorow. Definitely a fun read and most of all an inspiring book if, like me, you think that the city is really just a big playground.

There's a lot of buzz generating in NYC about this book so I had to check it out.

These guys know their city adventures and they also know their philosophy and literature. Who would think that an old abandoned aqueduct would bring to mind the words of Dante's Inferno?

Great summer reading. Not too smart to be boring but it never talks down to you. You'll definitely look at everyday bridges and rooftops and basements as inspirations after reading this book.

Highly recommended.

I too heard about this book in the New York Times and thought it would be right up my alley. I bought it immediately and after skimming the chapter titles thought it would be perfection.

They claim to be an Urban Exploration group that through their adventures try to reclaim forgotten bits of New York from obscurity. You see, many people tend to look at the city as a fixed entity and don't realize that behind every building and location there is history stretching back hundreds of years. There are unused tunnels, old abandoned train lines, and ancient buildings right under our noses as it were. Through their adventures, supposedly, they will search out these forgotten locations and tell us about them and apparently "bring them back to life" or something.

Except that half of their adventure trips don't "work". They try to get into the UN "Trilateral Commission" but are stopped at the front door of the UN and sent away by guards practically laughing at them. They try to explore the old City Hall subway station but can only lamely take the 6 train on its return loop through the station as it heads back uptown (a stunt anybody can do including a couple of tourists who took the loop with them). They try to find the rumored elevator in Grand Central Station that is able to lift entire train cars directly from the tracks and into the Waldorf Astoria Hotel, but only wind up jumping onto the MetroNorth tracks and wandering around for a while before leaving dirty (they did "discover" a hallway though).

For some reason they feel that doing these exploits with absolutely no planning or research is a mark of, um, I don't know. Its laughable to read about them standing around in the current City Hall Station looking for a secret door or passageway to the old station not knowing that indeed all you have to do is take the 6 train downtown and there it is. When they finally clue into this you'd think they discovered King Tut's Tomb.

To read about these exploits it is clear that in their minds they are the craftiest secret agents the world has ever seen. They are Manhattan's version of the French Resistance. They are Morpheus, Trinity and Neo awake and aware while the rest of the city is still captive to the Matrix. Now this would be all well and good if indeed they did accomplish what they claimed to set out to do, even once, but just trepassing isn't all that amazing.

A few chapters are actually interesting. The climbs up the two bridges and the walk through the old Croton Aqueduct. But again, that is just daring trespassing - something drunk high school students would do, and have done, for when they walk through the Aqueduct there is plenty of evidence of other people being there before them. And climbing a bridge is not uncovering anything forgotten or lost at all, its just daring.

Meanwhile, as they write these chapters, they disgress into so many tangents its staggering. They don't just mention Dante's Inferno as implicitly compare their stunts to a trip through Hell itself. Fine, so they are grandiose and a little braggadocio can be fun. But to imitate a typical section, coming across a penny on the sidewalk can get them going on about the invention of electricity, seamless nylon stockings, acid rain, horse breeding, compact discs, 17th century herbal tea recipes, the contents of George Washington's foot locker, the strengths and weaknesses of using toothpaste as an antacid, sand, cloud formations, Indian love songs, and how the riddle of "which is heavier a pound of feathers or a pound of gold" actually unlocks the secrets of the universe when viewed through non-euclidean geometry. Now someone sitting out there just coming across these topics for the first time may find this a fascinating display of intellectual pyrotechnics, but it really is just a stream of verbal diarrhea used to pad chapters and hide the fact that they are not coming close to achieving any of their stated goals.

To put these guys in the light they deserve, and to pop the bubble they have created around themselves and their website, just compare them to the "Open House New York" movement started by Scott Lauer a few years ago. Instead of trepassing on interesting sites, Scott goes up to them and ASKS if he can see what is behind the door. They usually say Yes. Not only that, but he organized a weekend in NY (October 11-12 this year) where dozens of these sites will be open to the public all at once (like the Pratt Institute's 19th century power plant in Brooklyn and the underground vaults in Greenwood Cemetary). There will be guides, tours, and information available to boot. For two groups with the same stated goal, Scott and a couple of his friends have accomplished much much more than this silly group of "Jinx Agents" have done or will do. For more information check out......

WARNING - no matter what this book says, it is NOT a guidebook. it is a very boring mission book written by some guys that i really feel sorry for (nerdy, misunderstood, few friends - this was gleaned from their own words, not mine). it is a book about their (mis)adventures. or really, their (boring)ventures. it never should have been written. at best, it could have been a blog - that nobody would have read except for their mothers. whoever gave this book 5stars must have written it.

on the plus side - they do give some interesting bits about the history of a few places. this was the ONLY redeeming feature of this book. otherwise, it was a COMPLETE waste of TIME and MONEY. in retrospect, i wish i had read the reviews before buying. if you are considering it, the only saving grace is the little bits of history the history they give. but it is nowhere near enough to redeem the book. its only the badly written stories of a few lonely kids that wanted to make themselves look cool - and terribly failed. i promise you will be disappointed.

Invisible Frontier is a masterpiece. Leibowitz and Deyo are brilliant writers, thoughtful historians and powerful philosophers. The book provides a well-needed source of dignity and pride for a generation of lost and humiliated souls. Invisible Frontier gives meaning to our nameless era, turning Generation X into Generation JINX. I thank them both for honoring a city and an era.