The Intimate City

Walking New York

By: Michael Kimmelman

Narrated by: Michael Kimmelman, William DeMeritt, Karen Murray, Eileen Noonan

Length: 6 hrs and 34 mins

Publisher's summary

From the New York Times architecture critic, his celebrated walking tours of New York City, now expanded, covering four of the five boroughs and some 540 million years of history, accompanied by some of the people who know it best

As New York came to a halt with COVID, Michael Kimmelman composed an email to a group of architects, historians, writers, and friends, inviting them to take a walk. Wherever they liked, he wrote—preferably someplace meaningful to them, someplace that illuminated the city and what they loved about it. At first, the goal was distraction. At a scary moment when everything seemed uncertain, walking around New York served as a reminder of all the ways the city was still a rock, joy, and inspiration. What began with a lighthearted trip to explore Broadway’s shuttered theater district and a stroll along Museum Mile when the museums were closed soon took on a much larger meaning and ambition. These intimate, funny, richly detailed conversations between Kimmelman and his companions became anchors for millions of Times followers during the pandemic. The walks unpacked the essence of urban life and its social fabric—the history, plans, laws, feats of structural engineering, architectural highlights, and everyday realities that make up a place Kimmelman calls “humanity’s greatest achievement.”

The Intimate City is the ultimate insider’s guide. The book includes new walks through LGBTQ Greenwich Village, through Forest Hills, Queens, and Mott Haven, in the Bronx. All the walks can be walked, or just be listened to for pleasure, by know-it-all New Yorkers or anyone else. They take listeners back to an age when Times Square was still a beaver pond and Yankee Stadium a salt marsh; across the Brooklyn Bridge, for green tea ice cream in Chinatown, for momos and samosas in Jackson Heights, to explore historic Black churches in Harlem and midcentury Mad Men skyscrapers on Park Avenue. A kaleidoscopic portrait of an enduring metropolis, The Intimate City reveals why New York, despite COVID and a long history of other calamities, continues to inspire and to mean so much to those who call it home and to countless others.

©2022 Michael Kimmelman (P)2022 Penguin Audio

Unique

Good review of well known and not so well known areas of the 5 Burroughs

A New York you need to imagine

A lockdown project created this fascinating view of New York. Through a series of real and virtual encounters and conversations woven into walks across the city with architects, historians and city planners, among others, the author reveals a city shaped by centuries of history. It’s a glimpse into one of the world’s busiest cities at a time of unparalleled quiet, where stories of nature, trees, ecology and the first people’s of this place open up windows into an incredibly rich natural past. Kimmelman also unearths the efforts of communities to create a liveable city. Listening to, rather than reading this book, is a meditative experience.

Excellent Book. Flawed audiobook presentation

I always learn from and appreciate Kimmelman and this audiobook is no exception. In this audiobook the author recruits notable architectural historians and engineers and walks through neighborhoods. It’s a wonderful idea but spoiled a bit by using professional narrators to substitute for the voices of the actual tour experts. I want my Andrew Scott Dolkart in his delightful, exuberant,’occasionally squeaky voice, not some smooth radio-voiced professional!

Take a tip from Malcolm Gladwell whose Talking to Strangers did this right: real people, real interviews in their genuine selves. Like they should be. I would buy this audiobook all over again if you did it right. In this case, a great author, a mediocre publisher.

Wonderful walking-tours of my Old Hometown

This collection of essays satisfied on a number of levels. I was born in New York City and left it over fifty years ago, so Kimmelman’s wanderings over so many of the streets of my childhood and youth stirred many memories.

But so much more than that, his tales didn’t just point out the highlights of the neighborhoods, he peppered each walk with the Geological, Historical, and Architectural characteristics of the sights and sounds he passed. Introducing the Reader to the voices of the residents let us hear the real stories that brought the streets to life. I knew these folks, having shopped in those stores and ate in those restaurants.

I recommend this book to Native New Yorkers, visitors, and armchair Travelers. It’s worth your time.
Four Stars. ****