Packer’s book on the consequences of economic disaster for a cross-section of everyday Americans focuses on Tampa as a microcosm of the mortgage crisis and the rise of the Tea Party. Apt enough, but then came the reviews, none more damning (of Tampa) than Dwight Garner’s for the New York Times: “… the City of Tampa in Florida, which had problems before the foreclosure crisis and seems like hell on earth now…” Italics ours. Hyperbole his.
This article appears in Sep 19-25, 2013.