What People Are Saying About "Strong Towns": The Book
The reviews are rolling in for Strong Towns: A Bottom-Up Revolution to Rebuild American Prosperity — and we're flattered and humbled by the not only kind but deeply insightful reactions to the book that, at long last, captures the core insights of the growing Strong Towns movement between two covers.
If you've started reading Strong Towns, you know it's not just a book about infrastructure, or city planning, or public finance, or urban design. It's a book about human nature—our tendency toward hubris and shortsightedness, on the one hand, but on the other, our endless ingenuity in building habitat for ourselves and finding better ways to live together in community.
And the most gratifying thing to us is that our reviewers so far not only get it; each of them has reflected the Strong Towns message back to us in a way that has helped us understand it a bit better ourselves. This is also what you, our readers and members of the Strong Towns movement, do every day, and we're so grateful.
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Praise for Strong Towns: A Bottom-Up Revolution to Rebuild American Prosperity
This is civic republicanism, participatory democracy, populist self-governance, and fiscal humility all rolled into one…. a great, vital work of localist theory, and needs to be honored for such.
-Russell Arben Fox, Front Porch Republic
If Marohn’s message of financial strength and resilience resonates in this time and place, it is because we feel something is deeply amiss in the American experiment, and that a solution is to be found somewhere at home. Strong Towns is a conservative vision for community that has not been tried and found wanting, but found difficult and left untried. It’s time we tried.
–Michael Hendrix, The American Conservative
It’s Green in the very best, from the ground up sense, more Kermit style than Green New Deal, and, as the author knows, it’s not easy being Green.
Whether from the front porch of an old house in the historical district or from a penthouse balcony enchanted by the City’s dazzling night-lights, Strong Towns will galvanize you into productive, worthwhile action. It’s not too late, it’s never too late. Step up, step out, get started.
-Randolph Severson, Amazon reader review
Strong Towns fans the flames of revolutionary pragmatism.
Chuck Marohn has done something remarkable here; he’s presented a practical response to the decline we see in our towns that reads like a revolutionary screed. He writes himself that implementing his ideas will be very hard for cities to do. However, I would challenge every city councilor, local leader and citizen to read this book with an open mind. To quote an old t-shirt, we need to question everything.
-Aaron Brown, Hibbing Daily Tribune
Cover photo: Joe Minicozzi of Urban3 has some advice for you: “Read this book.”