An opinionated, entertaining tour of a “gritty, tough, no-nonsense” place well worth visiting.
Inveterate city walker Helmreich continues his on-foot exploration of New York’s five boroughs.
In his latest journey, Helmreich takes on the Bronx, perhaps Gotham’s most underestimated (in terms of both reputation and real estate prices) area. “The tenements are slowly diminishing in number,” he writes, “and affordable housing, while not luxurious, is newer and far more attractive.” The author insists that the Bronx has much natural beauty to recommend it, even if you might not know it along some of his routes, with grand hotels and art deco structures of yore gone to seed and parks full of addicts. Head down Arthur Avenue, though, and you’re in what used to be a handsome Little Italy that rivaled the one in downtown Manhattan—though, as Helmreich notes, many of its pizzerias, like those of nearby Belmont Avenue, are now owned by Albanians. That’s a constant story. “In the not-so-distant future,” Helmreich writes, “they will be the dominant group, if they aren’t already.” The same is true in other parts of the borough, with enclaves of immigrants from all over the world. Sometimes there’s tension: One young Dominican woman he talked to strongly dislikes the Haitians who shared her island homeland, and one elderly White man grouses about the “5,000 killings a year on average” (the correct number, Helmreich notes, is 300). Thankfully, the author discovered more harmony than discord from block to block and refreshing diversity everywhere. Naturally, not everywhere is Eden: In Seton Falls Park, for instance, he observed garbage strewn everywhere, with sullen maintenance workers picking up “perhaps 10 percent of the total.” Refuse and occasional ill tempers notwithstanding, readers will be inspired to don sturdy shoes and head out to see some of the sights for themselves, especially little-known places such as Billie Holiday’s grave and tiny City Island, with “all the trappings of a New England coastal town.”
An opinionated, entertaining tour of a “gritty, tough, no-nonsense” place well worth visiting.Pub Date: Aug. 8, 2023
ISBN: 9780691166957
Page Count: 472
Publisher: Princeton Univ.
Review Posted Online: April 25, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2023
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A dauntless, moving account of a kidnapping and the horrors that followed.
Enduring the unthinkable.
This memoir—the first by an Israeli taken captive by Hamas on October 7, 2023—chronicles the 491 days the author was held in Gaza. Confined to tunnels beneath war-ravaged streets, Sharabi was beaten, humiliated, and underfed. When he was finally released in February, he learned that Hamas had murdered his wife and two daughters. In the face of scarcely imaginable loss, Sharabi has crafted a potent record of his will to survive. The author’s ordeal began when Hamas fighters dragged him from his home, in a kibbutz near Gaza. Alongside others, he was held for months at a time in filthy subterranean spaces. He catalogs sensory assaults with novelistic specificity. Iron shackles grip his ankles. Broken toilets produce an “unbearable stink,” and “tiny white worms” swarm his toothbrush. He gets one meal a day, his “belly caving inward.” Desperate for more food, he stages a fainting episode, using a shaving razor to “slice a deep gash into my eyebrow.” Captors share their sweets while celebrating an Iranian missile attack on Israel. He and other hostages sneak fleeting pleasures, finding and downing an orange soda before a guard can seize it. Several times, Sharabi—51 when he was kidnapped—gives bracing pep talks to younger compatriots. The captives learn to control what they can, trading family stories and “lift[ing] water bottles like dumbbells.” Remarkably, there’s some levity. He and fellow hostages nickname one Hamas guard “the Triangle” because he’s shaped like a SpongeBob SquarePants character. The book’s closing scenes, in which Sharabi tries to console other hostages’ families while learning the worst about his own, are heartbreaking. His captors “are still human beings,” writes Sharabi, bravely modeling the forbearance that our leaders often lack.
A dauntless, moving account of a kidnapping and the horrors that followed.Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9780063489790
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Harper Influence/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
A powerful reiteration of principles—and some fresh ideas—from the longest-serving independent in congressional history.
Another chapter in a long fight against inequality.
Building on his Fighting Oligarchy tour, which this year drew 280,000 people to rallies in red and blue states, Sanders amplifies his enduring campaign for economic fairness. The Vermont senator offers well-timed advice for combating corruption and issues a robust plea for national soul-searching. His argument rests on alarming data on the widening wealth gap’s impact on democracy. Bolstered by a 2010 Supreme Court decision that removed campaign finance limits, “100 billionaire families spent $2.6 billion” on 2024 elections. Sanders focuses on the Trump administration and congressional Republicans, describing their enactment of the “Big Beautiful Bill,” with its $1 trillion in tax breaks for the richest Americans and big social safety net cuts, as the “largest transfer of wealth” in living memory. But as is his custom, he spreads the blame, dinging Democrats for courting wealthy donors while ignoring the “needs and suffering” of the working class. “Trump filled the political vacuum that the Democrats created,” he writes, a resonant diagnosis. Urging readers not to surrender to despair, Sanders offers numerous legislative proposals. These would empower labor unions, cut the workweek to 32 hours, regulate campaign spending, reduce gerrymandering, and automatically register 18-year-olds to vote. Grassroots supporters can help by running for local office, volunteering with a campaign, and asking educators how to help support public schools. Meanwhile, Sanders asks us “to question the fundamental moral values that underlie” a system that enables “the top 1 percent” to “own more wealth than the bottom 93 percent.” Though his prose sometimes reads like a transcribed speech with built-in applause lines, Sanders’ ideas are specific, clear, and commonsensical. And because it echoes previous statements, his call for collective introspection lands as genuine.
A powerful reiteration of principles—and some fresh ideas—from the longest-serving independent in congressional history.Pub Date: Oct. 21, 2025
ISBN: 9798217089161
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Oct. 21, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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