From Julius Caesar to the Millennium Wheel—a look at London’s
history with its storied river ever in the foreground. To say
this is a brisk book is to understate the speed of its current.
Many chapters—all aptly and generously illustrated—comprise
fewer than 10 pages, and most summarize situations that other
writers have found sufficient to fill sturdy volumes of cultural
and riverine history, some of which appear in the bibliography.
Weightman has a different agenda, however: He wishes to
introduce us to the richness of his subject by offering slivers
with the certain knowledge that the curious will proceed to the
local library for more sizeable slices. The author, who
demonstrated that ice is nice in his previous work (The Frozen
Water Trade, 2003), sketches the history of the earliest
settlements along the river (the Romans were looking for a
crossing, not a site for a city), narrates the stories of
London’s many bridges (some of which, indeed, fell down), offers
us snippets about the Great Fire and the in