When You're from Brooklyn, Everything Else Is Tokyo - Hardcover

King, Larry; Appel, Martin

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0316493562 ISBN 13: 9780316493567

Publisher: Little Brown & Co, 1992

Synopsis

A renowned CNN talk show host remembers the Brooklyn of his youth, when Manhattan was "the city," the subway was a nickel, and Nathan's hot dogs were gourmet cuisine

About this title

From Kirkus Reviews

More good-natured memoirs from the king of chat. King (Tell Me More, 1990, etc.) rules the live airwaves these days. Here, he gives a clue to his success, saying ``I was always...Immediate Gratification King. It's why I love doing live radio and live television.'' It's also why he loves Brooklyn, the subject of these boyhood memoirs. King (born in 1933) was raised there in a Jewish-and-Italian neighborhood where the pursuit of pleasure was the name of the game. Food was ``a religious experience''--miraculous chocolate egg-creams, heavenly blintzes (``eat six or seven, then get right in your car and drive to the hospital for your heart attack''). Adventures with a teenage gang made way for girl-chasing and amateur theatrics. Working one summer in the Catskills, King ``got laid...on home plate at the Grossinger's softball field''; back in Bensonhurst, he matched muscles in a street-corner contest with another local Jewish boy, future Dodger superstar Sandy Koufax. Life revolved around family (lots of eccentric relatives here), sports, and, increasingly, the magic of radio. King imagines what it would have been like to be on CNN back in those days (from a fantasy interview with Hitler: ``It vas the people of Poland who called for us''). Happy memories notwithstanding, times were tough: King's father died young, and his mother went on welfare and worked as a seamstress in a sweatshop. King's prospects seemed gloomy. He was a terrible student, graduating high school with a 66 average; only his chutzpah and good will, both enormous, pulled him through. King concludes with a nostalgic visit to his childhood haunts. Murray the Barber is gone, so is Maltz's Candy Store; the neighborhood is sliding downhill. But still ``those inanimate objects were breathing that weekend, whispering memories to me, making my life full''--and making this reminiscence a warmhearted winner. -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

From Publishers Weekly

Radio/TV talk-show host and USA Today columnist King and TV producer and author Appel have put together a delightful composite memoir of growing up in Brooklyn during the 1930s, '40s and '50s. Heartwarming, sometimes uproarious, occasionally sad, the book is a wonderful picture of "a perfect blend of a little town in a big city." With an ethnic mix of Jews, Italians and Irish, the Brooklyn depicted here was a world of close-knit families that didn't have much money, of boys who were shy with girls (although most spun fictional tales of romantic conquests), of loyal Democrats who worshiped Roosevelt and came to respect Truman, and of fanatic Dodger supporters who hated team owner Walter O'Malley for moving their "Bums" to L.A. Sure to be snapped up by anyone who ever lived in the City of Churches, as it used to be called. Photos not seen by PW. Author tour.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Little Brown & Co
• Publication date: 1992
• ISBN 10: 0316493562
• ISBN 13: 9780316493567
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 235