“Dan Dain’s 'A History of Boston' arrives at a critical moment when cities like Boston contemplate their future in the post-pandemic era of hybrid and remote work. Dain offers up a compendium that spans both old and new Boston, reminding us how urban centers with staying power are hardly static. They rise and they fall, and whether they rise again depends on their ability to adapt to changing times.” —SHIRLEY LEUNG, Boston Globe columnist and associate editor