Atlas of Imagined Places: from Lilliput to Gotham City

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From Stephen King's Salem's Lot to superhero Wakanda, from Lilliput of Gulliver's Travels to Springfield in The Simpsons, a wondrous atlas of imagined places around the world. Locations from film, tv, literature, myths, comics and video games are plotted in a series of beautiful vintage-looking maps. If such thoughts have kept you awake at night, then the Atlas of Imagined Places: From Lilliput to Gotham City (Batsford Books; 2021) is just the book for you. Written by Matt Brown, editor-at-large for Londonist, and co-authored by Rhys B. Davies, this gorgeous book builds upon Mr Brown’s idea to map approximately 1,000 fictional British places, earlier depicted in Londonist’s ‘Fake Britain’ map ( more here), which now is expanded in this volume to include more than 5,000 fictional locations around the world. The 14 cities covered are Berlin, Chicago, London, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York City, Paris, Rio, San Francisco, Sydney, Tokyo, Venice and Washington DC. And on the far side of Costa Rica, we discover Isla Nublar, and the nearby island cluster known as Las Cinco Muertes – the Five Deaths – well named indeed, for here are the lost worlds of Jurassic Park, where genetically re-created dinosaurs once again rule the Earth!

Matt Brown is author of 11 books for Batsford, including eight titles in the popular Everything You Know... series of mythbusting books. He has served as editor and editor-at-large of Londonist.com for many years, writing on topics as diverse as street art, politics, map-making and science. With a deep love of trivia, he's written and hosted hundreds of quizzes, including events for the Museum of London, London Eye, Royal Institution, Royal Society and Manchester Science Museum, among many others. All of his books use humour and playfulness as tools to explore the world. He is tweeting at @mattfromlondon. The maps feature fictional buildings, towns, cities and countries plus mountains and rivers, oceans and seas. Ever wondered where the Bates Motel was based? Or Bedford Falls in It's a Wonderful Life? The authors have taken years to research the likely geography of thousands of popular culture locations that have become almost real to us. Sometimes these are easy to work out, but other times a bit of detective work is needed and the authors have been those detectives. By looking at the maps, you'll find that the revolution at Animal Farm happened next to Winnie the Pooh's home. From Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot to the superhero land of Wakanda, from Lilliput of Gulliver’s Travels to Springfield in The Simpsons, this is a wondrous atlas of imagined places around the world. Locations from film, tv, literature, myths, comics and video games are plotted in a series of beautiful vintage-looking maps. The maps feature fictional buildings, towns, cities and countries plus mountains and rivers, oceans and seas. Ever wondered where the Bates Motel was based? Or Bedford Falls in It’s a Wonderful Life? The authors have taken years to research the likely geography of thousands of popular culture locations that have become almost real to us. Sometimes these are easy to work out, but other times a bit of detective work is needed and the authors have been those detectives. By looking at the maps, you’ll find that the revolution at Animal Farm happened next to Winnie the Pooh’s home. Special thanks to Tyler McChantelle who, as on previous maps, has provided many locations. Ditto Amanda Oliver, who continues to fill in blanks.

What have we mapped?

Perhaps the most densely populated map is London. Whole fictional boroughs such as Walford (Eastenders) and Canley (The Bill) are served by fictional tube stations such as Hobb's End (Quatermass and the Pit) and Vauxhall Cross (Die Another Day). A constellation of famous characters fill in the gaps. Spies James Bond, Alex Rider and George Smiley all inhabit the same cluster of Chelsea streets. Phileas Fogg could pop across the road into Grace Brothers, and dalmatians Pongo and Perdita could easily be spooked by the Invisible Man. Yes, we have. The master file of this map goes all the way out to the M25. It doesn't look the prettiest at the moment, because much of it is blank space, but we'd love to fill that in. Please do send us your best suggestions for Bromley, Sutton, Bexley, Havering and the rest, and we'll get mapping. Who helped? From Stephen King's Salem's Lot to the superhero land of Wakanda, from Lilliput of Gulliver's Travels to Springfield in The Simpsons, this is a wondrous atlas of imagined places around the world. Locations from film, tv, literature, myths, comics and video games are plotted in a series of beautiful vintage-looking maps. A map on this resolution, though, can only scratch the surface of fictional London. For that, you can always browse our map of the Unreal City, which contains hundreds of fictional places in the capital.

A map like this can never be complete. London's fictional space is all but infinite. We've started the map with over 700 locations, but much remains to be added. From Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot to superhero Wakanda, from Lilliput of Gulliver's Travels to Springfield in The Simpsons, a wondrous atlas of imagined places around the world. Locations from film, tv, literature, myths, comics and video games are plotted in a series of beautiful vintage-looking maps. The map was created by Matt Brown and Rhys B Davies. We'll list the names of anybody who suggests a fictional location that we decide to use. Atlas of Imagined Cities takes 14 world cities, including London, and plots the homes of hundreds of fictional characters — from Del Boy and Rodney to Count Dracula to Mrs Dalloway. The maps also pinpoint dozens of famous fictional organisations and businesses — Central Perk, Ghostbusters HQ, Torchwood, Cyberdyne Sytems, Sterling Cooper, Tyrell Corporation, to name just a few of the more famous examples. A sneak peek at part of fictional Manhattan In addition to the maps and the accompanying essays describing the twisty logic that the authors used to finally pin point where these famous locations from fiction are (most likely) located, the Atlas also includes an extensive index along with map coordinates so it is easy to find a particular someplace on the maps (although I think you’ll agree that a magnifying glass is essential equipment for reading these thousands of entries).The maps also include fictional infrastructure, such as the great sea wall round LA from Blade Runner 2049, and the anti-Kaiju wall of Sydney from Pacific Rim. You'll also find the routes of fictional car chases, speedboat pursuits in Venice, the pilgrimage path of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, and much more. Fictional London mapped Inner London Nevertheless, this fascinating book is essential for any map enthusiast or devotee of popular culture. I am already eagerly awaiting the extra large pull-down classroom version of these maps so I can use them as blinds in my office. From Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot to the superhero land of Wakanda, from Lilliput of Gulliver's Travels to Springfield in The Simpsons, this is a wondrous atlas of imagined places around the world. Locations from film, tv, literature, myths, comics and video games are plotted in a series of beautiful vintage-looking maps.