THE LATINO EXPERIENCE

Latino Metropolis. By Victor M. Valle and Rodolfo D. Torres. Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press, 2000. xvi + 249 pp. Photo- graphs, notes, references, index. $47.95 (cloth); $18.95 (paper).

Magical Urbanism: Latinos Reinvent the U.S. Big City. By Mike Davis. 2000. xviii + 172 pp. London and New York: Verso. Maps, graphs, tables, notes, and index. $19.00.

James P. Allen
California State University, Northridge

These books are valuable additions to the scholarly literature on contempo- rary Latino life in the United States. Although Magical Urbanism includes examples from New York, Chicago, Miami, and occasionally other large cities, both books are focused on Los Angeles. This is not as parochial as it may appear. Many observers of the urban scene suspect that trends and patterns first visible in the massive five-county metro area of Los Angeles, whose Latino population easily outnumbers that of New York, will often be evident later or less clearly in other cities.