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vexyspice's review
5.0
I've never read a book that made me so happy and so sad all at once. Moss captured everything I've ever felt about the status of NYC. The hyper gentrification is alarming and it continues to break my heart to see the city change into something unsightly. Transplants trying to make it feel "like home" or commercializing areas to the point it doesnt look like what it once was, and its not a complement.
I wish this this didnt have to be written, but it is a reality that many of us true yorkers live.
I wish this this didnt have to be written, but it is a reality that many of us true yorkers live.
geneluigi's review against another edition
4.0
First of all, this is a beautifully written book. In every page, you can feel Jeremiah's love for the city. As a former honorary Brooklynite, I could get a sense of the points he makes in the book. However, falls short documenting the things that were not so good back in the days: crime rates for example. As other reviewers stated, it romanticizes the past and demonizes the present. It leaves you with a helpless feeling.
I get it when he frames the gentrification issue as something beyond individuals and puts the heavyweight on the real state agency and big banks. However, there are parts of it where it feels just as a complaint against "newcomers" It doesn't matter where they come from. Who is a welcome newcomer then?
A must-read, though.
I get it when he frames the gentrification issue as something beyond individuals and puts the heavyweight on the real state agency and big banks. However, there are parts of it where it feels just as a complaint against "newcomers" It doesn't matter where they come from. Who is a welcome newcomer then?
A must-read, though.
moth_dance's review against another edition
5.0
Sensational book to a (once?) sensational city.
I've heard so many old-timers bemoaning and cursing the current state of NYC and, by proxy, the younger generations that find themselves living in the city, either by choice or circumstance. It does get old and annoying real fast, cause often times, this old-guard ignores the fact that it's still a struggle for many people trying to make a decent living in NYC; marginalized American teenagers of immigrant families move in just as often as trust-fund babies. But Moss does an exceptional job at NOT sounding like a bitter old man.
Hyper-gentrification, as Moss explains, is intense and real for these neighborhoods and local businesses. This book helps spread awareness of so many issues and situations for so many different generations of (current and wannabe) New Yorkers. Like so many people I know, I can't do anything about arriving in the city in 2017 and not having those city experiences as people who arrived and lived there 5, 10, 20, 30, 40, etc. years ago. The city at present is the only one many people, myself included, will ever know. But maybe there's still some hope to be had, cause me and the majority of friends I know living in and around NYC actually try to seek out bits of the "real" NYC by talking to the people who've experienced many different parts of this changing landscape and supporting local longstanding businesses first. Perhaps the generations to follow Moss will demand more attention and funding of the city's history and landmarks and people, and help restore NYC to a new kind of former glory?
Also, after living in Queens for 2 years, I did feel let down by the briefest of chapters dedicated to Queens. But then again, I guess it's a good thing Moss didn't have much to cover on hyper-gentrification in Queens. Yet. I hope Moss continues this brave and tireless work of charting the current state of NYC without reservations or too much nostalgia. After all, books like this remind us that we can't go back, but we continue forward with the past and present in mind.
I've heard so many old-timers bemoaning and cursing the current state of NYC and, by proxy, the younger generations that find themselves living in the city, either by choice or circumstance. It does get old and annoying real fast, cause often times, this old-guard ignores the fact that it's still a struggle for many people trying to make a decent living in NYC; marginalized American teenagers of immigrant families move in just as often as trust-fund babies. But Moss does an exceptional job at NOT sounding like a bitter old man.
Hyper-gentrification, as Moss explains, is intense and real for these neighborhoods and local businesses. This book helps spread awareness of so many issues and situations for so many different generations of (current and wannabe) New Yorkers. Like so many people I know, I can't do anything about arriving in the city in 2017 and not having those city experiences as people who arrived and lived there 5, 10, 20, 30, 40, etc. years ago. The city at present is the only one many people, myself included, will ever know. But maybe there's still some hope to be had, cause me and the majority of friends I know living in and around NYC actually try to seek out bits of the "real" NYC by talking to the people who've experienced many different parts of this changing landscape and supporting local longstanding businesses first. Perhaps the generations to follow Moss will demand more attention and funding of the city's history and landmarks and people, and help restore NYC to a new kind of former glory?
Also, after living in Queens for 2 years, I did feel let down by the briefest of chapters dedicated to Queens. But then again, I guess it's a good thing Moss didn't have much to cover on hyper-gentrification in Queens. Yet. I hope Moss continues this brave and tireless work of charting the current state of NYC without reservations or too much nostalgia. After all, books like this remind us that we can't go back, but we continue forward with the past and present in mind.
ztaylor4's review against another edition
5.0
This book expressed a lot that I've felt as I've seen changes in my own neighborhoods. The changes aren't normal, and they aren't good.
fionamccarthy's review against another edition
informative
reflective
fast-paced
4.0
Finally finished this book after starting over a year ago - wow, it really made me understand so much of New York! The new glass buildings, the chain stores, “hipsters”, the culture of consumption and extraction (of food, drinks, entertainment…). It made me notice and appreciate small details like old buildings and old shops in between other big name shops that have been there for ages. Also very fun to read. Recommend for anyone who has spent some time in NYC!
meyatt's review against another edition
2.0
Interesting, but long on complaints and short on solutions.
valjoy's review against another edition
4.0
What can I say about this book? I called NYC home for an instant (four years in the 80s) and because of that I am attached to the city in ways that tourists and travelers are not. I visit as often as I can and try to search out vestiges of the NYC I knew and the NYC that existed before my short time there. Each time I go I’m struck and saddened by the loss of small businesses on every corner replaced with the chain stores that define suburbia. The author delves deeply and articulately into the cause and effect of hyper-gentrification. He ends his book with a list of what can be done to stem and even change the tide. It’s a complicated subject indeed but there is hope.
peteradamson's review against another edition
4.0
Well, *that* was depressing...!
In all seriousness, I found this to be much better researched than I would have thought; given the author's status as a blogger, it was rife with his anecdotes and opinions but it wasn't JUST that, which I appreciated.
I moved to NYC about ten years after he did. After twenty years of living here, much of what he describes I have observed first-hand, and as reprehensible as neoliberalism and hyper-gentrification are for NYC, I have to admit I have been a beneficiary of it, as I moved uptown from Chinatown, to the East Village, to Kips Bay, to the Upper West Side, to Harlem and now (finally) to the Bronx--each time moving to be able to afford to live on a middle class income and not spend ALL my money on rent.
So it's complicated...
In all seriousness, I found this to be much better researched than I would have thought; given the author's status as a blogger, it was rife with his anecdotes and opinions but it wasn't JUST that, which I appreciated.
I moved to NYC about ten years after he did. After twenty years of living here, much of what he describes I have observed first-hand, and as reprehensible as neoliberalism and hyper-gentrification are for NYC, I have to admit I have been a beneficiary of it, as I moved uptown from Chinatown, to the East Village, to Kips Bay, to the Upper West Side, to Harlem and now (finally) to the Bronx--each time moving to be able to afford to live on a middle class income and not spend ALL my money on rent.
So it's complicated...