Everyone and no one belongs to New York Two new books capture the resilient spirit of New York City – and the people who call it home. I am a New Yorker. I’ve lived in Britain for more than 35 years and in London for a quarter century. But New York is my hometown; New York is my soul. It’s been nearly two years, however, since I’ve sniffed the subway’s distinctive perfume or gazed at the starry roof of Grand Central Station; two years since I’ve eaten wontons from White Bear in the Flushing neighbourhood of Queens, or one of Juliana’s perfect pizzas in Brooklyn Heights. I have begun to have an inkling of what it used to mean to be an immigrant: to leave home knowing you might never see it again.