City of Sin: London and Its Vices

London, City of Sin
London, the place we grew up in
Just one great big loony bin
London!
                  - Opening song of "Elephant!" in The Tall Guy

I thought of The Tall Guy as I read City of Sin: London and Its Vices.  The third book in Catherine Arnold's trilogy is more entertaining than the first two installments due to some strategic name-dropping, but in the end it didn't make much of an impression.  A historical assay of adultery, prostitution, and pornography, sprinkled with tales of well-known sex scandals, it's not boring, but it's not deep either.  Very little of it seemed new and fresh, but then again, that's why they refer to prostitution as the oldest profession.  More diverting than its predecessors, City of Sin is only slightly less ephemeral.

Necropolis: London and Its Dead

For every person living in London, how many hundreds have been buried beneath the city? Enough that some of the Underground tunnels curve because the piles of buried, tangled bones were too dense to dig through. Catherine Arnold takes us on a tour of death, from the pre-Roman burial mounds through Roman funeral ceremonies, the mass graves of the Black Death, the scandals of overfilled and seeping cemeteries, the Victorian cult of mourning, and modern day practices. While generally interesting, Necropolis is essentially a survey of funeral practices, mentioning most and giving deep attention to few. I would have liked a little more detail, particularly about the rather morbid Victorians. Arnold has written three books (so far) about less savory aspects of London's history, and I hope her tours of madness and sin are a bit more enlightening.