I read this book some years back because I had read another of the author's books, Sometimes You See It Coming, and enjoyed it. This one was written well enough, but I didn't enjoy it near as much, maybe because the story wasn't that interesting to me. I get sick of all of man's political corruption.

As I remember it, this book was a well researched and inventive narrative with the arc of the story a popular criminal trial of the period (early twentieth century), with much of the action taking place at Dreamland amusement park in Coney Island. The criminal trial being about Tammany Hall police corruption. Many of the characters and events in Dreamland are purported to be based on real, historical accounts and people. ( )

Le mille luci di Coney Island si accendono ogni notte per dare il benvenutoagli immigranti. Tra di loro c'è Kid Twist, che subito viene arruolato nellamalavita, al servizio dello spietato gangster Gyp il Duro. Ma quando Kid loferisce per difendere un nano che lavora in un luna park, il giovane si trovadavvero nei guai. Come se non bastasse s'innamora, ricambiato, della sorelladi Gyp, una giovane ebrea piena di slanci, che cerca di sfuggire all'ambientefamiliare e alle violenze del fratello. Questa storia d'amore è il filoconduttore di un romanzo corale, denso di colpi di scena e con unimprevedibile finale

Tra la prima e l'ultima pagina di questo potente e ambizioso romanzo si stende una città, New York, colta in un momento cruciale della sua storia, tra '800 e '900.
Una città ribollente di vita e di storie in cui, tra milioni di altri individui, due coppie vivono il loro amore: Josef Kolyka, detto Kid Twist, e Eshter Abramowitz; Trick il Nano e Carlotta la Pazza.
Seguendo le loro vicende, il lettore si troverà immerso nell'ambiente scatenato di Coney Island e nel mondo yiddish del Lower East Side; tra la malavita della Bowery, animata da gangster che si chiamano Gyp il Duro e Louie lo Spagnolo, e da immigrati da ogni parte del mondo; assisterà alle lotte sindacali e per l'emancipazione femminile, alle trame della politica, alla vita dei ragazzi di strada; ascolterà lingue diverse, passerà dalla tragedia alla festa come da un isolato all'altro, si incontrerà persino Freud, Jung e Ferenczi durante il loro viaggio negli Stati Unit

This novel set at Coney Island and other sites in New York City in the early 20th Century is as just as concerned with the place and time period as it is with its plot. But there is enough plot to hold it together and it kept my interest. A few characters have some heft, but most seem like representations of a type. ( )

Dreamland, titled after the Coney Island amusement park of the same name that was in its heyday at the time, starts with a tale from Trick the Dwarf about a bizarre twist of fate and the love story that resulted. The story then mushrooms out to take in the points of view of a couple notorious New York City gangsters, a factory girl involved in early union activity, a prostitute, a Tammany Hall politician, and, oddly enough, Dr. Sigmund Freud. With these characters, Kevin Baker vividly brings to life the downtown New York of the early 1900s, plagued by crime and poverty but also somehow larger than life and full of possibility.

He was astonished, for the first time, to see how many people there were and how fast they were moving. Straddling each avenue were high steel girders, pylons holding up the trains that raced madly through the night, sometimes two at a time, in opposite directions, until they made the whole street shake. It was a frantic, crowded, nightmare world that he could not wait to join.

Baker's gangsters are based on real historical gang members, with their stories tweaked and their lives and motives re-humanized. These gangsters disappoint their parents, immigrate from Eastern Europe in search of a better life that never seems to materialize. They care for their sisters and their lovers, all in between killing and maiming. Naturally, there is a love story, and a good one at that, between an exiled gangster and the girl he meets on Coney Island. There is no small amount of crooked politicking. There is disturbing violence, both random, provoked, and shocking, in the case of the early labor movement.

With Dreamland, Baker paints a picture of a city struggling through its many growing pains and trying to come of age. While there were definitely some storylines I could have easily done without (adios doctors Freud and Jung - what are you guys doing here anyway?), I was, for the most part, totally taken in by Dreamland and its gritty, larger than life portrait of New York City at a pivotal point in history. Baker ably breathes life into each of his many characters and marches them steadily toward an explosive conclusion that expertly weaves many narrative strands into one pivotal day on Coney Island.

"A magnified Prater," he sniffed to Ferenczi and Brill, referring to the cheesy midway in the Vienna park - but the Prater was like a summer garden party compared to this. Everything louder, bigger, more hysterical - more American. ( )

I finished reading this book just as the tv programme Boardwalk Empire aired in the UK.

The book tells the tales of a colourful variety of characters in the post-depression era, all connected by Dreamland amusement park at Coney Island. There is a politician, a gangster, a female immigrant and Trick the Dwarf, a performer at the amusements.

For me the book belonged to Esse, daughter of Eastern European immigrants and an underpaid seamstress in The Triangle - a hazardous factory. She takes trips to Coney Island every Sunday to escape her homelife, and one week meets a handsome stranger. She doesn't yet know about his connections, nor he hers.

The historical research that's gone into the book is very evident, and that alone would make me recommend it to others. Strange to be reminded of a time when food and material possessions were hard fought for. I haven't yet watched Boardwalk Empire, but I hope it's every bit as good as Dreamland. ( )