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dpfaef
Written on Jul 6, 2015
Part history of cartography and part true crime the The Map Thief tells the story of Forbes Smiley, antiquarian map dealer turned map thief to support a life style. I guess I am not that interested in the history of cartography and less so of Forbes Smiley's shallow existence.
The book was slow going and I found hard to follow as the author moved from past to present. The history of cartography, at times felt like filler to cover the skimpy biography of Forbes Smiley. It is astounding that anyone would steal maps from libraries for personal gain. It puts a taint on all of antiquarian map dealers and leaves me with the impression that collector's really don't care where the map came from. One could tell from looking that the maps are old but where did they come isn't often asked.
Forbes Smiley stole millions of dollars of maps and only spent four years in jail, says a lot about how we handle white-collar crime.This review was originally posted on THE PFAEFFLE JOURNAL
The book was slow going and I found hard to follow as the author moved from past to present. The history of cartography, at times felt like filler to cover the skimpy biography of Forbes Smiley. It is astounding that anyone would steal maps from libraries for personal gain. It puts a taint on all of antiquarian map dealers and leaves me with the impression that collector's really don't care where the map came from. One could tell from looking that the maps are old but where did they come isn't often asked.
Forbes Smiley stole millions of dollars of maps and only spent four years in jail, says a lot about how we handle white-collar crime.This review was originally posted on THE PFAEFFLE JOURNAL