Skid Road

"Over more than half a century, no one has written a better book about Seattle. I keep looking for something, but Skid Road has our soul down cold."

"No one who has ever written Pacific Northwest history can match Murray Morgan’s craftsmanship, the signal virtues of which are pace, precision, humor, and a keen eye for the characterizing detail."

"Mr. Morgan’s book is the sort of corrective history that all communities should welcome."

"Skid Road served as an accent to successive periods in Seattle’s history, from its gawdy boisterous uncontrolled days as the takeoff for the Alaskan gold fields, to the settling down to a staid respectability. . . . There were days of questionable ethics, in journalism, in politics. There were reformers. And throughout, the exceptional personality of the city itself dominates its story."

"You can probably find this book lying around the house of anyone who's been in Seattle long enough to get even a little bit interested in the city's past. . . . [Morgan is] exactly the kind of guy you'd probably enjoy having show you around town."

"Morgan portrays the people and the city with affection, delight, honesty and humor. More history should be written in this manner."

"A lively view of the lumbering boom town during its first hundred years."

"Murray Morgan, no question about it, is one the Pacific Northwest’s most competent word craftsmen. He can take history (which need not be dull, but frequently is) and make it read like first-rate fiction."

"The best-selling portrait of the city’s pioneers, and the area that lent its name to skid row sections of other cities."

"This often anecdotal history of the city focuses on key people and incidents, to good effect."

"Murray Morgan brings the early days of Seattle roaring to life on the page in all their rowdy, bawdy, clangorous glory. Always informative, but never dry, Morgan is more than a historian, he's a great storyteller. When did reading history become so fun?"