For a brief time after its founding in 1941, Desert Hot Springs, California, was a boom town. Eventually, though, the boom went bust....

Geoff Dyer spent two weeks aboard the USS George H. W. Bush. Another Great Day at Sea, recently published by Pantheon, is his remarkable account of that stay....

Without the “vertical railways” of the elevator, not only would cities like New York, Tokyo, and Hong Kong bear no architectural resemblance to their current forms, they would also be radically different social spaces....