Product Description

This book is about the thousands of people who live in the subway, railroad, and sewage tunnels of New York City.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #287831 in Books
• Published on: 1993-01-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 280 pages

Customer Reviews

Informative, brilliantly portrayed and heartrending.
So far so good. This book is all that I hoped for. Being a writer myself generally on a topic of life beneath the streets of New York on a purely fictional level, The Mole People supplied me with all the missing links. I am half way through it, and enjoying every well written word. I commend Jennifer Toth on her research and realise that the information she has supplied has indeed taken the fantasy out of tunnel life. Beauty and the Beast as written by Ron Koslow showed us a wonderful life beneath the streets of Manhattan so much so that around 3000 fans of the TV show would have given their right arm to escape the world above just to live down in the tunnels. But Jennifer Toth has shown us the real world beneath the city streets, the courage of those that reside there and the heartbreak of those who through having nowhere but beneath the streets to live have had their children taken from them and placed into care. Certainly not quite the euphoria I and other Beauty and the Beast followers write about. Truly Jennifer Toth's exploration of life beneath the city's streets has opened my eyes, and I am indebted to her for doing so. For bringing to my mind the suffering such people living such lives undergo just for survival. It brings it home to me how wicked the world we live in is, how heartless and uncaring people can be, and I know I will never look upon the plight of the homeless in quite the same way again. From now on I will be more caring toward such people in any way that I can wherever they may be. So thank you Jennifer from the bottom of my heart.

an informative and a fun read
The Mole People by Jennifer Toth was a wonderful novel that gave its readers incredible information about the underground. The book was written like a documentary, aimed to inform more than to entertain. The description that Toth used all throughout the book was excellent. "In the recess of the tunnel, Mac does not need a trap with stale food or a feces-soaked rag to catch 'track rabbits,' as rats are known to the underground homeless. They come because the garbage is as dense as its stench." Descirbing the scene she was witnessing, Toth gives her audience a clear picture of what underground life is really like. I think that Toth did an excellant job incorporating the facts along with the stories; making the book a very fun read. Some chapters were committed completely to statistics and opinions of the aboveground variety, while other chapters told the real life stories of inhabitants of the tunnels. The Mole People was fascinating in the sense that it introduced me to a way of life that I never even knew existed. The tunnels underground New York City are filled with thousands of homeless people; some living as far as seven stories beneath the street. With separate communities, some even including doctors, teachers and mayors, the people who live in the tunnels are all unique. Some of the mole people, as they are referred to by those uneducated about the underground, are very independent of each other, while others rely heavily on their tunnel neighbors. "The surprising wonder of Bernard's tunnel is less that people can survive in such an environment than that they can work together and even care, sometimes intensely, for each other." One of the many communites descirbed in the book, Bernard's tunnel is a prime example of a different society underneath the streets. Separate from the rest of the world, but with the same qualities as all great cities. I was greatly impressed with the research tactics that Toth used to get information for her book. Risking her life hundreds of times, she traveled deep into the tunnels to speak with all kinds of the underground population. She made the tunnels part of her life, making visits there every day, and gaining many friends along the way. I would recommend this book to anyone. It's an incredibley interesting book that will definitely open up any eyes to the importance of the mole people.

great for young people also
I am 12 I read the book and thought it was great. I thought for me living in a small town it would expand my knowledge. I liked the way she described the underground life for people. It educated me alot about NewYork city. I also just enjoyed the book all together. I highly recomend it.