A review by annewithabook
How the Other Half Lives by Jacob A. Riis

4.0

Just like Nellie Bly’s book Ten Days in a Mad-House was supposed to show the horrible conditions in Blackwell’s Asylum, this book takes a step off that island and back to New York City, where the poor lived in horrifying conditions. Even reading it in the modern day, it hard to imagine how horrible those people’s lives must have been. Often they would work inside tiny, dark, hot rooms for seventeen hours a day. The landlords wouldn’t fix anything, toilets were outside (five toilets may be shared between a hundred or more people), and dirt and grime was everywhere.

Full review on my blog: https://madamewriterblog.com/2020/02/12/book-review-how-the-other-half-lives-by-jacob-a-riis/