I very much enjoyed this book. I found Mark's writing style naturally light and easy to engage with, and soon felt as though I was walking alongside him, listening to his commentary and coming to know him a little better with the turn of each page.

I learned a great deal about London. I've never lived there myself, but it was a city which as a young man held a lot of fascination for me. I could relate easily to Mark's thoughts about how city life does affect us though due to my time in other capitals and the effect this had on me.

A light read good for those times when you just want to coast leisurely through something interesting.

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Brilliant book. Mason walks all the Underground line on the surface. Lots of history, lots of facts, written really beautifully and with lots of wry wit. ( )

Over the last year or so I have taken to walking around London, completing staged routes such as the Capital Ring and London Loop, and have marvelled at the wealth of interesting sight and the variety of neighbourhoods. I am, however, a bit of a lightweight walker compared to Mark Mason who seems to think nothing of covering thirty five miles in a day. Nowadays I get tired just driving that far!

Mason lived in different parts of London during his twenties and thirties and, like so many of us, had always been enchanted by Harry Beck's famous (and constantly evolving) map of the Underground system. As a keen walker he gradually formulates the idea of walking the whole length of each of the lines, almost as an act of homage to the city. He is familiar with several of the areas that he walks through, though by dint of his research (aided by his 'geeky' friend Richard who might fairly be described as more than a little obsessive about the Underground) he is deeply informative about all of the localities he visits.

Taking the eleven London Underground lines in turn (he eschews the London Overground line as a mere pretender to the status) he follows their route at ground level, taking the opportunity to enlighten the reader with snippets of local history and miscellaneous arcana about the lines themselves. He is an entertaining narrator, and I found myself enchanted by his descriptions of his different journeys. He starts with the Victoria Line, embarking from Brixton and striding out northwards towards the river and beyond, reaching Walthamstow in the early evening, having covered nearly twenty miles.

He gives a humorous running commentary as he goes along, peppered with wry observations and social comment, though never to an intrusive degree. I am not sure which I found more entertaining: his descriptions of areas with which I was familiar (and regarding which I seemed to share a lot of his opinions) or his accounts of areas that I didn't know at all. I do know that I am tempted to revisit a lot of his journeys, though my walks will be rather more fragmented than his. Thirty-five miles in a day through London streets is perhaps rather more than I might aspire to, and I will also give his Circle Line pub crawl, featuring a drink at the nearest pub to each of the twenty-six stations, a miss, too.

All in all I found this highly entertaining. I hadn't encountered Mark Mason before, but will now certainly be looking for his novels. ( )

This book appealed to me as I have often thought that as a tourist to London, if you use the tube, you lose the sense of how one place connects to another above ground. Much better then to walk above the ground, between the sights. But in this book the author goes much further than a tourist would. Some of the underground lines are so long, that even walking 30 miles in a day, the whole line needed to be walked over a couple of days. I loved the mix of historical information, observations (including snatches of conversations overheard), litlle known sights along the route and interaction with others who joined the walks at various points for various reasons. This is a really good read for anyone who enjoys travel writing and/or visiting London and is interested in a different perspective on London travel. ( )