A Plague on Your Houses: How New York Was Burned Down and National Public Health Crumbled, Paperback

A Plague on Your Houses is a scorching indictment of the decision to close fire companies in New York in the 1970s and a frightening study of the way misguided and malevolent social policy can spark a chain reaction of enormous and unforeseen urban collapse.

Deborah Wallace is the author of In the Mouth of the Dragon: Toxic Fires in the Age of Plastics and, with Rodrick Wallace, Studies on the Collapse of the Fire Service in New York City. She works as an ecologist for Consumers' union.

Rodrick Wallace is a research scientist in the Department of Mental Health Epidemiology at the New York State Psychiatric institute.