Lionel: A Century of Timeless Toy Trains
This attractive, oversized book blends striking color photos with a history of the production of Lionel trains. For toy train enthusiasts, the photos will be the most interesting facet of the book. Most illustrated books of collectible toy trains are fairly straightforward, with endless pictures of locomotives and cars viewed side-on to show what they really look like. By contrast, commercial photographer Milne has produced almost impressionistic photographs. They feature selected details, limited depth of field, dramatic lighting, unusual angles, and train layout backgrounds. Given the large page size and high-quality paper, the pictures are particularly attractive. Fun to read, the text by dealer and collector Ponzol covers very familiar territory, but with the addition of comments on the interrelationships between the toys and their times. It also has occasional errors, and it's sometimes uncritically enthusiastic, perhaps reflecting the role of the current Lionel company in the packaging of the book. Still, Lionel trains have a wide nostalgic and collector appeal, and Lionel should therefore have a large public library audience. Frederick A. Schlipf, Urbana Free Lib/GSLIS, Univ. of IllinoisCopyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.