Train: Riding the Rails That Created the Modern World—from the Trans-Siberian to the Southwest Chief

Journalist and author Zoellner, who wrote about the shooting of Gabrielle Giffords (A Safeway in Arizona) and "the most powerful element in the world" (Uranium), takes to the rails in seven countries in this book. He looks at the state of this often underrated but essential mode of transportation, in places as different and far apart as Peru, India, Russia, the UK, Spain, China, and the United States. The author mixes his fascination for trains and the conversations he has with his fellow travelers (railway workers and enthusiasts, commuters, and Russian soldiers are just a few of the many people he meets) into a detailed story told with knowledge and enthusiasm. While the train has been used as a political tool in China, where the government has finally brought its massive railway network to Lhasa, the capital of Tibet, in an attempt to defuse the movement for independence, Spain has become the envy of other modern nations with its fast-growing infrastructure of bullet trains.