Favorite Books by City

good thread subject! back later.

Oh, well, I'll give a start.

Venice, Italy

Alibi, by Joseph Kanon. Loved it, except possibly the last two pages.
The Donna Leon police procedural series with Guido Brunetti as the protagonist.
The World of Venice, James Morris (aka Jan), non-fiction
Venice Observed, by Mary McCarthy, non-fiction

and many more on Venice, I'll have to jog my memory.

Kiev:

Michail Bulgakov: Master and Margarita

St. Petersburg:

Dostoievsky and Tolstoy (multiple)

Fresno, California:

William Sarroyan: Human Comedy

Vienna
John Irving: Setting Free the Bears, 128 Pound Marriage, World According to Garp.....

Boston (and its environs): David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest

Prague:

Franz Kafka: Castle (? Zamek in Czech)
Ludvik Vaculik: Coffee with my Interrogator
Milan Kundera: Unbearable Lightness of Being, Laughable Loves
Ivan Klima: My Beautiful Mornings
Karel Capek: Malostranske povidky (Stories from Mala Strana)

... list goes on and on...

I know you are talkin' real books, but I love John Sanford's Prey series In Minneapolis St. Paul.

Silly me, almost forgot... another Tom Robbins book, and another one for New Orleans: Tom Robbins's Jitterbug Perfume

Not exactly heavyweight reading, but...

Boston
Robert B. Parker's "Spenser" novels.

3/4 of why I read crime/procedurals are for "place"...

Yeah, I especially enjoy seeing the place from the sardonic point of view
of a hard-boiled detective.

Mookbarking

Or notso hard boiled.

I also really like the view of New York from Lawrence Block. He has a number of variants on it.

RH

again, not serious lit, but it's me...

Henning Mankell for Finland and Sweden

lots of people for Japan - my latest but not least is Miyuki Miyabe, All She Was Worth

For Istanbul, nonfiction, Orhan Pamuk, despite a dump on him I read this morning, I'd recommend the book, Istanbul

a procedural for Istanbul, The Ottoman Cage by Barbara Nadel


On Sandford, I'm over him. Pulsing sensationalist that he is, I liked him for the first few books I read.

Did I mention Maj Sjovall and Per Wahloo, ten books set in or around Stockholm?

Denver, that fellow, is it John Banning? have liked all I read by him, usually books involving an ex cop with bookstore, but most recently I read his older book, Denver. Very good, a keeper.




Joseph Kanon's book Los Alamos is also a keeper, and in many ways different but not so, than that book of his, Alibi, set in Venice, Italy. Guy is a good writer, whatever the location. The one set in Venice really got me mentally involved.

A comment - I tend to slam sensationalist pulsing, but there's some background for that. A, I read most out there that fits that category so I speak from long time reader point of view. B, got interested in procedurals without that predictability, at least re pulse timing. C, makes me wonder, has any one else read those yellow paperbacks with the Raven on the binding? I used to buy them for 50 cents at Marlow's.





Back to place. Maybe someone else will start with Los Angeles. I can fill that out...

Off of crime as such, how about Bruce Chatwin....

William Trevor..

William Trevor writes about Ireland. I've loved his writing for a long time, and my favorite book was loaned to a neighbor, and never seen again, with me not remembering the title. Trevor is in a league of his own, certainly re short stories. Dunno re city, precisely, so I suppose I'm philandering, wandering.

On Dublin, there's Nuala O'Faolain, some fiction, some non fiction.

I think Jen Banbury's Like a Hole in the Head is set in Los Angeles, but I will double check that before I officially add it to the L.A. list.

Gads. LA...

Raymond Chandler, for a start.
Dashiel Hammet, however you spell that.

but many many more.

Favourite Books by City
A Star Called Henry
by Roddy Doyle

City: Dublin, Ireland