Book Log 2022 #59: St. Mark's is Dead by Ada Calhoun

St. Mark's Place is a stretch of 8th Street in New York City's East Village, and has long been home to people on the fringe. This book goes all the way back - the first section lists a timeline of 10,000 BC to 1904 - to look at who lived there and how the neighborhood's continued changes over time belied the common refrain that the change meant that St. Mark's was dead.

Calhoun grew up in the neighborhood in the 1970s, and the people and places of her time on St. Mark's makes up the bulk of the book. She has clear affection for the neighborhood, warts and all, and does an excellent job of describing the vibrancy created by the cast of characters who lived, worked, and played there.  I'm not usually that interested in New York stories (having spent my entire life in the shadow of Boston), but I was drawn in from the start. It's a highly colorful and entertaining history and social commentary, which laments what's been lost but celebrates how the street rolled with the changes.

I picked up the book for a reading challenge (a book with your name in the title), and wasn't expecting to like it as much as I did.