Anthony McElligott's volume on life in German cities is inventive, informative, and interesting. Like other contributions to the “Routledge Sources in History” series, it combines historical analysis with presentation of a broad assortment of mainly primary documents, both written and graphic. The author has excavated this material to good effect from a variety of sources, weaving it together skillfully under thematic headings. He has accordingly produced a volume that affords a multifaceted view of urban experience in Germany during the first half of the twentieth century, when the big city (Großstadt) both reached its apogee and became an increasingly contested and controversial site of social and cultural processes.