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Look, I'll admit it - I'm a Niven fan from way back when Ringworld blew my teenage mind in the 80s. He is, though, at his best when his character (he only really has one, with a few carbon props moving around in the background) is exploring an artifact.

Here, the artifact is the society of Destiny, settled by humanity long enough for a distinct social order to emerge and individual cities to form their own cultures. Unfortuntely, I couldn't find it in myself to care that much, and when Jemmy did encounter something interesting he'd then go off and be boring for 20 pages.

I reread this as part of a book challenge in Another Place, and it still held up for me lo these many decades later.

James is very much the sort of boy that you usually met in the edgier British children's work, but still rang true to life as he dealt with both his family, indifferent friends and a poltergeist from 300 years earlier. it's the sort of work I'm slightly surprised was never adapted for television (unless it was, I haven't looked).

Fritz Leiber has as good a claim as anyone to being the father of urban fantasy, and this is well worth a read from a historical standpoint even though it's been surpassed by later works.

Interestingly, it seems more dated than "Conjure, Wife" which is almost explicitly set in the 1950s - perhaps the more precise grounding in time exempts it.