Roam From Home
Reading around my adopted home, New York City.
Like most people who love New York, I wasn’t born here.
I grew up in Canada and all my life, New York was distinctly other – the exotic place in my mind where I parked all my grand plans, my imagination, and my ambition.
When I was young, I read to transport myself to the city. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn felt like medicine. The Catcher in the Rye felt like preparation. And E.B. White’s Here Is New York felt like inspiration:
“There is the New York of the person who was born somewhere else and came to New York in quest of something. Of these three trembling cities the greatest is the last—the city of final destination, the city that is a goal. It is this third city that accounts for New York’s high-strung disposition, its poetical deportment, its dedication to the arts, and its incomparable achievements. Commuters give the city its tidal restlessness; natives give it solidity and continuity; but the settlers give it passion.”
Now, I’ve lived in the city for years. First Manhattan, now Brooklyn. The truth is that life grinds on after the dream of the city is realized. But I’m still not above being dazzled by this place. And I’ll never get over the thrill of reading here while living here. Some of my all-time favorite New York City reads are:
Super Sad True Love Story / Gary Shteyngart Near-future New York dystopia in which people dismiss books as smelly and anachronistic, preferring to stare into their "äppäräts" instead. So now, basically.
The Goldfinch / Donna Tartt A mother's death at the Met, living off others on Park Avenue, restoring antiques in Greenwich Village, and all the while consumed by an obsession with a girl and a painting.
Just Kids / Patti Smith Oh to be two young artists, bohemian, and inseparable. These stories – of shared museum tickets, shared Coney Island hot dogs, and a shared room at the Chelsea Hotel – are why people (i.e. me!) move to New York.
The Power Broker / Robert A. Caro Took Robert Caro seven years to write, and me nearly seven years to read. The history of one infuriating man ends up feeling like the entire history of New York. An education.
Fates & Furies / Lauren Groff A story of marriage – as told by the two people in it – that feels so much bigger than two people in love. Takes on identity, reinvention, creativity, and human nature.
The Bonfire of the Vanities / Tom Wolfe Master of the Universe Sherman McCoy gets lost in the South Bronx (which happened to me once too, and made me feel so New York), with fascinating and terrible consequences.
Underworld / Don DeLillo Giants vs. Dodgers baseball, life's ebbs and flows, and one of my favorite character names of all time (Klara Sax).
The Rules Do Not Apply / Ariel Levy Things fall apart spectacularly (in New York, on the west coast, even in Mongolia). One of Levy's quotes prior to the unspooling: "Nothing really bad could happen to me in my movie, because I was the protagonist."
Let the Great World Spin / Colum McCann Irish brothers in outer boroughs, a prostitute on trial, a wire walker, and more than a half dozen other narrators. One, Gloria, says "It had never occurred to me before, but everything in New York is built upon another thing, each thing as strange as the last, and connected.”
A Visit From the Goon Squad / Jennifer Egan Music moves, time slips away, and 13 characters flit in and out of each other's stories, like the literary fiction equivalent of New York, I Love You.
The Catcher in the Rye / J.D. Salinger Isolated and impulsive Holden Caulfield runs around New York spouting all my favorite phrases – "phonies," "that killed me," and "I got a bang out of that."
I Was Told There'd Be Cake / Sloane Crosley This book makes the minutiae of daily life feel riveting. Crosley loses her keys, bitches about being a bridesmaid, and calls the cops on her neighbors. For a while, I thought I was Sloane Crosley.
Motherless Brooklyn / Jonatan Lethem Modeled on a stock detective novel but isn't. Somewhat perversely, watching Lionel tic his way through the Zen Buddhist school got me to take up meditation (I lasted about two weeks).
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn / Betty Smith My childhood touchstone, detailing the delights and traumas of life in Williamsburg a century ago. Spoiler: Williamsburg was very different back then.
Here is New York / E.B. White Half of the great New York quotes on Pinterest started here. The other half were said by Woody Allen. One of the best: “The city makes up for its hazards and its deficiencies by supplying its citizens with massive doses of a supplementary vitamin – the sense of belonging to something unique, cosmopolitan, mighty and unparalleled.”
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay / Michael Chabon Great escapes, comics, friendships, and grinding it out in New York. So nice I photographed it twice!