Bohemia Village Voice

Hastings: Then and Now by Ken Brooks

Hastings: Then & Now by Ken Brooks.
Reviewed by Bronwyn Pryde.
This book does exactly what it says on the tin: photographs of the town taken around the turn of the 20th century are compared side by side to pictures taken 100 years or so later from the same viewpoint. What is most impressive is how much care the author, who also took all of the ‘now’ pictures, has taken with his pictures. Mr Brooks has gone to great pains to get as close as possible to the exact same viewpoint as the original image so that comparisons are easy to make. The area covered is the Old Town to the town centre and each picture comes with an informative description. The ‘then’ and ‘now’ pictures are concerned primarily with the architecture of the town but there is a small section at the end of the book of photographs focusing on people of the town some 100 years past. A book to treasure and to keep. 
o Hastings: Then and Now by Ken Brooks. Published  2004. 100pp. £9.50. Available now from the Bohemia Village Voice office.