Being in the real estate industry, I am a big fan of maps. I like how they help visual the world around us. There is the physical sense of the objects around us and how to get from one point to another.

But maps can also help us visual information in many different ways. That is what interested me in Strange Maps by Frank Jacobs. I first heard about the book from an interview on the Freakonomics blog: Maps: Fighting Disease and Skewing Borders.

I encountered the book and the Strange Maps blog at the same time. Although, it took a few months for the book to surface in my reading stack. (The blog was being published before the book.)

As you might expect, the book is very blogish. Each page has a map and a narrative about the map. There are some great ones, some mediocre ones and some so-so ones. You take the hits with misses. In the end there is lots of interesting visuals and interesting information. After reading Strange Maps, you won’t view a map the same way.