Thanks to NetGalley for an ANC of this book. While I’m a map geek and lover of Vegas, I’d really only recommend this book to those who really want to get into the minutiae of Vegas area history.

Based on the excerpt I read, Mapping Historical Las Vegas provides a comprehensive overview of the famous (and infamous) city, including geography, architecture, and public history, The author clearly has a lot of affection for Las Vegas, and it comes through on every page.

Las Vegas has been known as “Sin City,” run by the Mafia, Elvis and that the the Flamingo was the first casino on the Strip. Is any of this true? It’s not! The author has written a history of Las Vegas with 136 color maps including the natural history besides the “human” history of it and the surrounding territory. The author has describe the changes that Las Vegas has gone through. Lack of change is also shown. It is a land that has gone from exert to urban and populate by Indigenous people to ask gambling town. It’s an in depth work of research that I enjoyed reading as I learned so much about Las Vegas. I won’t only think of it a a gambling city as I am now wanting to go and see what was described in the book. I found it to be a fascinating book that has awaken my curiosity of Las Vegas.

I came to this book thinking it was something different than it was. This has colored my opinion of the book. I was expecting beautiful language, creative use of maps, and generally a creative non-fiction book (CNF). That's not what this is, instead, it is a pretty detailed history of Las Vegas. This isn't a bad thing and if that is what you are looking for, look no further. The prose is clear and makes a good attempt at simplifying very complex historical events. If I'd have realized that was what this book was supposed to be, I might have enjoyed it more. As it stands the misunderstanding is my fault, but I didn't love the book. It would have been more approachable from a CNF standpoint.

I received a free Advanced Reading Copy via NetGalley in exchange for a complete and honest review.

One of the best books I've read in a long while.

I was lucky enough to get to read an excerpt of this book and my goodness I can’t wait to get my hands on a finished/full copy! I didn’t realize that this was only an excerpt going in, and honestly it’s probably good that it was because I was so fascinated that I would have probably lost an entire day reading this.

The thing about this book that’s obvious from the very beginning is just how passionate the author is about the history of Las Vegas and how much time and energy they put in to making this book. I mean, creating these maps and then writing about all of it? I can’t even imagine how long that took. It definitely pays off though because you can feel how important this is to them and how much they enjoy talking about this area.

This was especially fascinating to me since I’m Canadian and live nowhere close to Nevada, this small part of the book has made me want to visit when that’s not something I ever wanted to do before though. I’d say that’s pretty damn impressive.

I will definitely be purchasing a copy of this book once it’s released and I can’t wait to settle in and learn even more about the history and geography of Las Vegas.