Taylor's New Yorkers to John Murray

John Murray is publishing New Yorkers: A City and Its People in Our Time by Craig Taylor, the follow-up to his successful 2011 book Londoners (Granta), in March 2021.

The book will publish on 8th March in hardback, e-book and audiobook, after UK and Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada, were bought from Tracy Bohan at The Wylie Agency.

Six years in the making, New Yorkers draws on hundreds of interviews conducted by Taylor, creating "a grand portrait of New York City" and "hymn to the vitality and resilience of its people".

Taylor, who is also editor of Five Dials magazine, said: "New York has been through a lot in last couple decades: terrorist attack, blackout, hurricane, recession, social injustice and pandemic. Unsurprisingly, the residents of that great city have a lot to say to say on these subjects — and many others. I’m thrilled that New Yorkers will feature a timely chorus of voices coming from those who propel the city each day—subway conductor, bodega cashier, elevator repairman and many more. I’m lucky that these voices capture the city’s messy reality, from a Black Lives Matter activist speaking in the wake of police shootings to a victim of Covid and the nurses who got him through to safety. We may not be able to visit New York, so these extraordinary people have to come to us."

Joe Zigmond, editorial director at John Murray, said: "Having spent six years meeting New Yorkers of every religion, persuasion, politics and stripe – all the imaginable variety of a thrumming metropolis – Craig has created a landmark portrait of the 21st century city. His book is a stupendous achievement, a hypnotic human epic, a musical testament to the progress and failure, the kindness and cruelty of the urban swell."