Content tagged with "nyc"
A lovely collection of blog posts about all the hidden stuff in your city. Why lampposts are shaped the way they are. Why manhole covers are round. What the markings on sidewalks mean. It’s a great reader – every “chapter” is really just a blog post or podcast episode, so you can read 4-5 of them in…
I bailed out on this book at exactly the halfway point . I had such high hopes, but the book was essentially just a recitation of the lives of the people who lived at 740 Park Ave. Chapter after chapter was a dissection of these people’s lives, to the point of extreme tedium. Some colorful…
This is a lovely history of New York City, focused down to a single street. It follows Broadway north from the southern tip of Manhattan, mile by mile, and talks about the history of the city as the street moved northward. Along the way, it has random vignettes of things that happened on the street….
Apparently, no one knew who actually owned The Empire State Building for a period of years, back in the 90s. A Japanese billionaire had bought it at a cheap price, because it was saddled with a really crappy 114-year lease. But he had actually directed his daughter to buy it , and she and her…
Incredible oral history of Saturday Night Live. There’s no actual narrative to this book – the entire thing is just a series of anecdotes told by cast members, writers, occasional hosts, and others. I loved the format, disagreements and all. 750 pages, and would have gladly read 750 more.
This is an extremely short book . Start to finish, it might take you 30 minutes. It’s more of a handbook of the different physical markers you can find of the internet in NYC. It has a directory of manhole covers, for instance, and descriptions of what different pavement markings mean. There’s some…
I read this book for the pure titillation level, because I’m fascinated by high society in general and New York culture in particular. And the book delivered on that level – there are some horrifying anecdotes where of a woman trying to fit into Upper East Side mommies. Women who use Birkin bags as…
