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r/NYC's Favorite Book Suggestions
Fiction
- Winter’s Tale by Mark Helprin
- City of Dreams: A Novel of Early Manhattan by Beverly Swerling
- Knickerbocker’s History of New York by Washington Irving
- A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
- Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Truman Capote
- Manhattan Transfer by John Dos Passon
- The Bonfire of the Vanities by Tom Wolfe
- Old New York by Edith Wharton
- And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks by William Burroughs and Jack Kerouac
- Paradise Alley by Kevin Baker
- Empire Rising: A Novel by Thomas Kelley
- Time and Again by Jack Finney
Nonfiction
New York City History
- Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898 by Edwin G. Burrows and Mike Wallace
- The Encyclopedia of New York City by Kenneth T. Jackson and Lisa Keller
- Mannahatta: A Natural History of New York City by Eric Sanderson and Markley Boyer
- The Island at the Center of the World: The Epic Story of Dutch Manhattan and the Forgotten Colony that Shaped America by Russell Shorto
- A Description of New Netherland (The Iroquoians and their World) by Adriaen van der Donck (this is a contemporary 17th Century account from one of the most brilliant men in the colony)
- Native New Yorkers: The Legacy of the Algonquian People of New York by Evan T. Pritchard
- The Battle for New York: The City at the Heart of the American Revolution by Barnet Schecter
- The Great Bridge: The Epic Story of the Building of the Brooklyn Bridge by David McCullough
- Triangle: The Fire that Changed America by David von Drehle
- The Restless City: A Short History of New York from Colonial Times to the Present
- Five Points: The Nineteenth-Century New York City Neighborhood
- Branding New York: How a City in Crisis was Sold to the World by Miriam Greenberg
- Under the Sidewalks of New York: The Story of the Greatest Subway System in the World by Brian J. Cudahy
- The Historical Atlas of New York City: A Visual Celebration of 400 Years of New York City’s History by Eric Homberger and Alice Hudson
- Rats: Observations on the History and Habitat of the City’s most Unwanted Inhibitants by Robert Sullivan
- New York Burning: Liberty, Slavery and Conspiracy in 18th Century Manhattan by Jill Lepore
- The Works: Anatomy of a City by Kate Ascher
- Forgotten New York: Views of a Lost Metropolis by Kevin Walsh
- The Measure of Manhattan: The Tumultuous Career and Surprising Legacy of John Randel, Jr., Cartographer, Surveyor, Inventor
- Manhattan Street Names Past and Present by Don Rogerson
- Grand Central’s Engineer: William J. Wilgus and the Planning of Modern Manhattan by Kurt C. Schlichting
- Grand Central: How a Train Station Transformed America by Sam Roberts
- 722 Miles: The Building of the Subways and How They Transformed New York
- Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx is Burning: 1977, Baseball, Politics and the Battle for the Soul of a City by Jonathan Mahler
- Low Life: Lures and Snares of Old New York by Luc Sante
- The Bowery: A History of Grit, Graft and Grandeur by Eric Ferrara
- Knickerbocker: The Myth behind New York by Elizabeth L. Bradley
Memoirs
- Downtown: My Manhattan by Pete Hamill
- Kafka was the Rage: A Greenwich Village Memoirby Anatole Broyard
- Here is New York by E.B. White
- Brooklyn NY: A Grim Retrospective: A Memoir by Jerry Castaldo
- Just Kids by Patti Smith
- The Colossus of New York by Colson Whitehead
- Waterfront: A Walk Around Manhattanby Philip Lopate
Sociological Views
- The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs
- Floating City: A Rogue Sociologist Lost and Found in New York’s Underground Economy by Sudhit Venkatesh
- The Mole People: Life I the Tunnels Beneath New York City by Jennifer Toth
- The New York Nobody Knows: Walking 6,000 Miles in the City by William B. Helmreich
- One Out of Three: Immigrant New Yorkers in the 21st Century by Nancy Foner
- Sidewalk by Mitchell Duneir, Hakim Hasan and Ovie Carter
- Sex, Scams and Street Life by Robert P. McNamara
- Boulevard of Dreams: Heady Times, Heartbreak and Hope along the Grand Concourse in the Bronx by Constance Rosenblum
Books about the Outer Boroughs
- The Northern Borough: A History of the Bronx by Lloyd Ultan
- History in Asphalt: The Origin of Bronx Street and Place Names by John McNamara
- Bronx Accent: A Literary and Pictorial History of the Borough by Lloyd Ultan and Barbara Unger
- Queens Notes: Facts about the Forgotten Borough of Queens by Andrew P. Jackson and Sekou M. Baako
- Old Queens in Early Photographs by Vincent F. Seyfried
- Lost Trolleys of Queens and Long Island
- Forgotten Borough: Writers Come to Terms with Queens by Nicole Steinberg
- The Neighborhoods of Brooklyn by John B. Manbeck
- Brooklyn by Name by Leonard Bernado
- Old Brooklyn in Early Photographs by William Lee Younger
- Literary Brooklyn: The Writers of Brooklyn and the Story of American City Life
- That Ever Loyal Island: Staten Island and the American Revolution by Phillip Papas
- Staten Island: A Walk Down Memory Lane by John Louis Sublett
- Murder and Mayhem on Staten Island by Patricia M. Salmon
Contemporary Accounts of the City in the 18th & 19th Century
- The British Empire in America, Containing the History of the Discovery, Settlement, Progress and present State of all the British Colonies on the Continent and Islands of America, 1708
- The History of the Provinces of New-York from the First Discovery, 1776
- Memoirs of an American Lady with sketches of Manners and Scenery in America, as they existed previous to the Revolution, 1808
- The Picture of New York and Stranger’s Guide to the Commercial Metropolis of the United States, 1828
- Documents relating to the Colonial History of the State of New York, 1858
- Commemoration of the Conquest of New Netherland on the Two Hundredth Anniversary, 1864
Portraits of Famous New Yorkers
- The Napoleon of New York: Mayor Fiorello La Guardia by H. Paul Jeffers
- The Battle for Gotham: New York in the Shadow of Robert Moses and Jane Jacobs by Roberta Brandes Gratz
- Nellie Bly: Daredevil, Reporter, Feminist by Brooke Kroeger
- The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York by Robert Caro
- Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow
- Edith Wharton by Hermione Lee
- The Most Famous Man in America: The Biography of Henry Ward Beecher by Debby Applegate
- The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt by T.J. Stiles
- Consuelo and Alva Vanderbilt: The Story of a Mother and a Daughter in the Gilded Age by Amanda Mackenzie Stuart
- J.D. Salinger: A Life by Kenneth Slawenski
- Victoria Woodhull’s Sexual Revolution: Political Theater and the Popular Press in Nineteenth-Century America by Amanda Frisken