Cities in America were coming apart in the late 1960s and 1970. Areas previously and still inhabited by working class whites were being burnt to the ground, house by house, block by block. Considering the magnitude of what happened, it is a curiously undocumented period in American history. So this is a brave book, in that it attempts to document some of what happened in this period. However it is written from a neo-Conservative perspective. If you really want to understand why America came apart, I recommend reading an exploding bombshell of a book called "Culture of Critique".

This is a must-read. Having grown up in the NYC area during that era, this valuable history of the Ungovernable City is a walk down Memory Lane, which, in 1977 New York, probably would've been half-burned down for the insurance money while the other half was busy promoting 25-cent "memories."

The Koch/Cuomo drama, Bella Abzug's big-hatted bizarreness, Abe Beame's inheritance of the Lindsay liberal nightmare and his own failure to wake up from it, possessed dogs, Reggie, Billy, Steinbrenner, graffiti'd up IRT cars... they're all in there!

"The Bronx is Burning: 1977, Baseball, Politics and the Battle for the Soul of a City"
By Jonathan Mahler

I was intrigued by the title of Mahler's book, since it incorporates several of my interests-- politics, sports and journalism but I didn't expect such a good product. It was the Summer of '77: the end of Disco and the beginning of Punk Rock; a pivotal year in politics with the ascendancy of Mario Cuomo and Ed Koch; a monumental ego fight between Reggie Jackson and Billy Martin; and the paranoia of Son of Sam. Then the lights went out, leading to looting and anarchy.
Mahler manages to weave these disparate story lines into a cohesive whole. I was reminded of Tom Wolfe's "Bonfires of the Vanities," which did the same thing for the 'eighties. 1977, Mahler says, was the last year of indiscriminate,unprotected sex before the outbreak of aids, and it saw a devisive election pitting the City's ethnic and economic interests against each other.

Mahler has a good ear for dialogue and a keen eye for detail. His descriptions of the City I grew up in and love are memorable. Of Studio 54 he writes:

"Studio 54 took the escapist ethic of the disco scene to its absurd extreme. An outsize prop of the Man on the Moon shoveling a coke spoon under his nose, shirtless busboys in white satin gym shorts and sequined jockstraps, busty women hanging upside down from trapezes, a fifty-four-hundred square foot dance floor crowded with undulators, balconies crowded with fornicators - this wasn't about avoiding reality as much as it was about obliterating it." (Mahler, P. 168)

I particularly appreciated Mahler's account of the journalistic wars brought on by
Australian Press Lord Rupert Murdock, who took the city by storm and inhaled the New York Post . The Baseball part is a bit too much "Inside Baseball" for me...which may be the reason ESPN optioned the story and made it into a TV Miniseries.
I wish Mahler had spent a bit more time on the Son of Sam story...it's sort of an afterthought to the rest of the book. Here was a pudgy, nondescript postal clerk living in a walk-up efficiency filled with porno, who had the entire city on edge. Kind of like Jack the Ripper turning out to be a mild mannered grocery store clerk.
Mahler brings the style of a magazine writer and the immediacy of a sportswriter to urban history. It's a good read.

"The Bronx is Burning: 1977, Baseball, Politics and the Battle for the Soul of a City"
By Jonathan Mahler

I was intrigued by the title of Mahler's book, since it incorporates several of my interests-- politics, sports and journalism but I didn't expect such a good product. It was the Summer of '77: the end of Disco and the beginning of Punk Rock; a pivotal year in politics with the ascendancy of Mario Cuomo and Ed Koch; a monumental ego fight between Reggie Jackson and Billy Martin; and the paranoia of Son of Sam. Then the lights went out, leading to looting and anarchy.
Mahler manages to weave these disparate story lines into a cohesive whole. I was reminded of Tom Wolfe's "Bonfires of the Vanities," which did the same thing for the 'eighties. 1977, Mahler says, was the last year of indiscriminate,unprotected sex before the outbreak of aids, and it saw a devisive election pitting the City's ethnic and economic interests against each other.

Mahler has a good ear for dialogue and a keen eye for detail. His descriptions of the City I grew up in and love are memorable. Of Studio 54 he writes:

"Studio 54 took the escapist ethic of the disco scene to its absurd extreme. An outsize prop of the Man on the Moon shoveling a coke spoon under his nose, shirtless busboys in white satin gym shorts and sequined jockstraps, busty women hanging upside down from trapezes, a fifty-four-hundred square foot dance floor crowded with undulators, balconies crowded with fornicators - this wasn't about avoiding reality as much as it was about obliterating it." (Mahler, P. 168)

I particularly appreciated Mahler's account of the journalistic wars brought on by
Australian Press Lord Rupert Murdock, who took the city by storm and inhaled the New York Post . The Baseball part is a bit too much "Inside Baseball" for me...which may be the reason ESPN optioned the story and made it into a TV Miniseries.
Mahler brings the style of a magazine writer and the urgency of a sportswriter to urban history. It's a good read.

"The Bronx is Burning: 1977, Baseball, Politics and the Battle for the Soul of a City"
By Jonathan Mahler

I was intrigued by the title of Mahler's book, since it incorporates several of my interests--law, politics, sports and journalism but I didn't expect such a good product. It was the Summer of '77: the end of Disco and the beginning of Punk Rock; a pivotal year in politics with the ascendancy of Mario Cuomo and Ed Koch; a monumental ego fight between Reggie Jackson and Billy Martin; and the paranoia of Son of Sam. Then the lights went out, leading to looting and anarchy.

Mahler has a good ear for dialogue and a keen eye for detail. His descriptions of the City I grew up in and love are memorable. Of Studio 54 he writes:

"Studio 54 took the escapist ethic of the disco scene to its absurd extreme. An outsize prop of the Man on the Moon shoveling a coke spoon under his nose, shirtless busboys in white satin gym shorts and sequined jockstraps, busty women hanging upside down from trapezes, a fifty-four-hundred square foot dance floor crowded with undulators, balconies crowded with fornicators - this wasn't about avoiding reality as much as it was about obliterating it." (Mahler, P. 168)

I particularly appreciated Mahler's account of the journalistic wars brought on by
Australian Press Lord Rupert Murdock, who took the city by storm and inhaled the New York Post . The Baseball part is a bit too much "Inside Baseball" for me...which may be the reason ESPN optioned the story and made it into a TV Miniseries.
Mahler brings the style of a magazine writer and the urgency of a sportswriter to urban history. It's a good read.

"The Bronx is Burning: 1977, Baseball, Politics and the Battle for the Soul of a City"
By Jonathan Mahler

I was intrigued by the title of Mahler's book, since it incorporates several of my interests--law, politics, sports and journalism but I didn't expect such a good product. It was the Summer of '77: the end of Disco and the beginning of Punk Rock; a pivotal year in politics with the ascendancy of Mario Cuomo and Ed Koch; a monumental ego fight between Reggie Jackson and Billy Martin; and the paranoia of Son of Sam. Then the lights went out, leading to looting and anarchy.

Mahler has a good ear for dialogue and a keen eye for detail. His descriptions of the City I grew up in and love are memorable. Of Studio 54 he writes:

"Studio 54 took the escapist ethic of the disco scene to its absurd extreme. An outsize prop of the Man on the Moon shoveling a coke spoon under his nose, shirtless busboys in white satin gym shorts and sequined jockstraps, busty women hanging upside down from trapezes, a fifty-four-hundred square foot dance floor crowded with undulators, balconies crowded with fornicators - this wasn't about avoiding reality as much as it was about obliterating it." (Mahler, P. 168)

I particularly appreciated Mahler's account of the journalistic wars brought on by
Australian Press Lord Rupert Murdock, who took the city by storm and inhaled the New York Post . The Baseball part is a bit too much "Inside Baseball".

Mahler brings the style of a magazine writer and the urgency of a sportswriter to urban history. It's a good read.

Jonathan Mahler has written an exceptionally well-crafted book about a single year (1977) in the history of New York City. The fascinating story alternates between the Yankees and mayoral politics. As the ball drops in Time Square to usher in the New Year, New York and the Yankees are far down in the standings, but the situation is about to get much worse.

In 1977, New York City goes bankrupt and nobody in the nation gives a hoot, the Yankees haven't won the World Series in years and everybody outside New York is delighted, the lights go out in the worst blackout in the city's history and the poor loot and burn, Reggie Jackson comes to the Yankees and his teammates yawn, and Mario Cuomo and Ed Koch slug it out to win the honor to run this disaster.

There is an old adage that a sports team eventually takes on the personality of the head coach. Can a city take on the personality of a sports team? Or does a sports team accommodate its home city. These parallel stories told in The Bronx is Burning make you wonder about the relationship between sports and politics and the value of heroes in our society.

The Bronx is Burning is really about leadership, or more specifically, a public's desperate search for leadership. In hindsight, 1977 was the bottom of an ugly cycle. Reggie Jackson, Mr. October, rose to heroic heights to deliver New York City another World Championship and Ed Koch will be remembered as the courageous mayor that started the turnaround of a once great city that still had its best years in front of it.
The Shut Mouth Society
The Shopkeeper

Jonathan Mahler has written an exceptionally well-crafted book about a single year (1977) in the history of New York City. The fascinating story alternates between the Yankees and mayoral politics. As the ball drops in Time Square to usher in the New Year, New York and the Yankees are far down in the standings, but the situation is about to get much worse.

In 1977, New York City goes bankrupt and nobody in the nation gives a hoot, the Yankees haven't won the World Series in years and everybody outside New York is delighted, the lights go out in the worst blackout in the city's history and the poor loot and burn, Reggie Jackson comes to the Yankees and his teammates yawn, and Mario Cuomo and Ed Koch slug it out to win the honor to run this disaster.

There is an old adage that a sports team eventually takes on the personality of the head coach. Can a city take on the personality of a sports team? Or does a sports team accommodate its home city. These parallel stories told in The Bronx is Burning make you wonder about the relationship between sports and politics and the value of heroes in our society.

The Bronx is Burning is really about leadership, or more specifically, a public's desperate search for leadership. In hindsight, 1977 was the bottom of an ugly cycle. Reggie Jackson, Mr. October, rose to heroic heights to deliver New York City another World Championship and Ed Koch will be remembered as the courageous mayor that started the turnaround of a once great city that still had its best years in front of it.

The Shopkeeper

This is exactly what a journalistic history book should be. Fast, fun, and informative, as the book reviewers would say... Plus, it's about baseball, riots, tabloid journalism, politicians and serial killers. What's not to like? Its kind of hard to remember now, but New York in 1977 was a city on the verge of total and utter collapse. We're talking bankruptcy, massive civil unrest, serial killers. Oh, and Reggie Jackson.

Mahler does an excellent job of bringing all of this together to give a wonderful snapshot of period of New York history that was like no other. If you care about baseball, politics, or New York, this is a great read.

I liked the ESPN miniseries "The Bronx is Burning" so much I decided to get the book, too. I liked the television series way better. I think the main reason is that the ESPN show, which of course focused on the Yankees '77 season, interspersed the mayoral campaign, the Son of Sam, and the blackout looting throughout the series to really demonstrate how crazy it was in NY in 1977. The book often focuses on topics in chunks.

The looting, for example, is concentrated in Part Two of the book. I understand that makes sense because it took place within a short period of time and didn't occur throughout the year. The Son of Sam, however, isn't mentioned until page 245 and he's caught 25 pages later and then the book shifts to the mayoral campaign. Sometimes, these events seem like isolated stories and it is easy losing sight that these things were taking place in the same year and in the same city--that "the Bronx was burning."

As other reviewers have noted, Mahler includes a lot of background info in his book. Some background is needed, of course, to set the 1977 stage, but how much do readers need to know about the history of the NY Post and Mario Cuomo's work in Corona and Forest Hills in the late '60s and early '70s to get a clearer picture of what was going on in 1977? When he discussed Bushwick's socioeconomic decline in the 1960s to explain why looting took place during the power outage, I lost interest. Strangely, although there is a lot of background information, the book ends abruptly with the Yankees victory celebrations. There is no information on what happened to the principal characters in the book. Thurmon Munson, for example, was killed in a plane crash only two years later. It would have been nice to know how Ed Koch's regime faired. Just some brief updates would have been nice (the miniseries included updates).

On a positive note, I enjoyed reading about Reggie Jackson. I liked Mahler's witty line "in vintage fashion, [Reggie] dedicated [his autobiography] to his biggest fan, God" (pg. 113). Some reviewers did not like the focus on Jackson, but the book is not just about the Yankees, it is about the "battle for a soul of a city," and the Jackson-Billy Martin-George Steinbrenner triangle was one of the big news stories of that year. The description of how the power outage happened was exciting to read, although I could not understand the technological part of it. The final tallies on the blackout lootings was eye-opening (pg. 218).

In summary, for as intriguing a topic as this book covered, I was surprised the book wasn't better. I think if Mahler better connected the events it would have improved the book. I was disappointed in the book, but at least there was an excellent miniseries that came out of it.

Loved this book....



Living and playing in NY during the 70's this all hit home from a different perspective.

I was a student living in Manhattan and never really understood why the city was crumbling all around me. All I knew is that I needed to stay home on Saturday nights (Son of Sam on the loose). I tried not to take the Subways after dark. I stayed away from 42nd street at all cost and could never understand why NY Yankee fans were so angry! I was very annoyed by the blackout but only because it was sweltering out and I could not watch TV. But yet the city still had the energy that I loved so dearly.



Some of us never really understand what is happening and why. We are all in our own little world and were concerned about only what was around us. That is the beauty of history. It tells the story of where we have been and where we need to go.



Jonathan Mahler weaves an incredible tale of a city in crisis. We can feel the city crying out with their financial, emotional and spiritual woes. We can all learn from the lessons NYC took in the summer of 1977. He not only tells the current story of NYC that summer but also the background of all the places, people and things that lead to the eruption. The actual events that happened with the Con Edison black out and how valiant the police effort was during the riots even though half their force was laid off. The mayoral race and how the political machine runs. The manhunt for Son of Sam and how a parking ticket held the key to the mystery. And of course the well loved NY Yankees and the history of George, Billy and Reggie and how each behaved differently for the love of the game.



Whether you are a history buff, NY Yankees fan or just a plain NYC fan ---- this book is a must read

I was a junior at Brooklyn College during 1977. Mass transit was a mess. Brooklyn College was filthy. Crime was out of control. And the Son of Sam was gunning down people my age. Ah, the good old days!

Jonathan Mahler has created a virtual time capsule of that year in his fast-paced, yet well-reasoned, book, "Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx is Burning." Unlike other books that describe an era in New York City's history, Mahler's book actually acknowledges that their are four other boroughs besides Manhattan. And they are all given equal time (except Staten Island), which makes the book all the more comprehensive.

While the focus is undeniably on the tumults going on in Yankee Stadium (on and off the field), the book documents the other goings-on in the city that, justifiably, makes 1977 a pivotal year in the city's modern history: the blackout and riots; the mayoral election; the palpable fear in the hearts of most New Yorkers; the tabloidization of the New York Post; and the Yankees first World Series championship in over a decade. In one form or another, these events changed The City for the better or worse, depending on your point of view. The sections on Disco, punk rock and on the activities of the gay population were the only ones I felt were irrelevant, not because they weren't important, but I didn't think they were specifically 1977 phenomena. Still, they were interesting.

One way or another, anyone interested in New York history will love this book and devour it. I know I did. Now if you don't mind, I got to put on my dancing shoes, shine up my pet rock and head for Studio 54.

I had heard a lot of good buzz about this book since it was published a few years ago. When I found out ESPN was making a mini-series out of it, I decided to take the plunge and buy it. I actually didn't end up watching the mini-series, but I loved the book.
One of the things that initially kept me away was the much-hyped baseball angle. Like any red-blooded American baseball fan that doesn't hale from the Tri-State area, I am life-long Yankee hater, and those George Steinbrenner/Billy Martin teams of the late `70s gave me plenty to hate. The last thing on earth I wanted to read was some hagiographic account of the Bronx Bombers winning the 1977 World Series.
I needn't have worried. The Evil Empire's tumultuous season is just one of several neatly interwoven story lines: New York's fiscal crisis, the city's nasty '77 mayoral election, Rupert Murdoch's purchase of the moribund New York Post. Several other subplots add spice: the blackout riots, Son of Sam, the burgeoning disco scene. New York was a busy place that summer.
There's nothing too profound here, just a snapshot of our greatest city at one of the lowest points in its history. Well paced and enjoyable, the book got me through several long airplane trips.

It didnt focus on the yankees as much as i thought it would, and when it did, most of it was about Reggie. All the events of that summer were interesting and I remembered a lot of it happening too which was cool.

I was impressed with the amount of factual research Jonathan Mahler put into this wonder readaptation into the year 1977 in NY City. He takes a book and illustrates a wonderful slice of history into multiple aspects. There are several issues that keep the reader interested in the book. I particularly like books that have multiple plots and subplots. Mahler was able to keep each chapter full of intrique with a look into human experience and emotions of the key characters in this one year of magic. The final chapter he puts out: "The Bronx is burning, ladies and gentlemen, as we watch the 1977 World Series".......

This is an excellent account of New York City and its troubles both on the baseball field and in the political arena. I highly recommend this for anyone who is interested in the NYY ball club and the politics of New York City, particularly in the late 1970's.

It's hard to believe the author of this book was a little kid when he first visited New York in the 1970s. I first moved to NYC as a young adult during this decade, and found this book reverberating with the discouraging urine-stained decay that was ubiquitous then -- graffitied subways, homeless bums, massage parlours, garbage strikes, crime, loan defaults...

And yet... beneath all this, there must have been some kind of resolve and determination... or perhaps simply infrastructure... that allowed Manhattan, at least, to ultimately avoid the suburban flight afflicting the rest of the nation's inner cities. New York is still New York, but those dark abandoned streets of 1970s Manhattan today sport boutiques and spanking-clean SUVs from one end nearly to the other (of course, the outer boroughs have not been so lucky). While this has also resulted in a loss of character and the sad conversion of Manhattan's old ethnic neighborhoods, it is also testimony to the endurance of urban culture, of some kind, in at least one American city.

Enough social commentary and onto the book! At first it seems that much of the plot may concern the dynamics of Reggie Jackson & Billy Martin and the Yankees; also figuring large are the 1977 blackout and the mayoral race. It would have been easy, and appealing, to showboat the charged conflict among Reggie, Martin, and Steinbrenner; but the author never succumbs to this temptation. Instead he seamlessly weaves the story of 1977 New York in the context of the cultural, political, and financial background of the times. Even Studio 54, punk rock, The Mercer Arts Centre, and Soho are given lip service.

What makes it all so good is the natural trajectory that makes for an entertaining read -- it is hard to put down, like a good mystery; it tells a story. This is great non-fiction: historic, accurate, nuanced, and atmospheric -- and as entertaining as any fictional narrative could be.

This is a fun book and an easy read but there are problems.

First, poor people get shafted. It's OK that most of the featured characters are rich and famous and have enormous egos, but the author gives them plenty of pages of background before they play their roles in the years 1976-1977. In fact, at times I felt, "I've had enough of these chapters about Reggie Jackson's (or the New York Post's, or John Lindsay's) early history. Let's move on to the year in question, 1977."

However, what about the background on the people who rioted the night of the NYC blackout? Their background stories come after the fact - if at all. Why didn't Mahler describe the impact, on NYC's enormous poor population, of the city's continual cutbacks on services, before he showcased the blackout lootings? It's as if the poor people of Brooklyn, Harlem and the Bronx sprang out of nowhere. Where's their character study?

Second, I think the author is wrong when he writes, "Sandwiched between the arrival of AIDS on New York's shores during the 1976 bicentennial celebrations and the first reported cases of the virus in 1978, 1977 was the last great year of unprotected, non-reproductive sex...." His only source for this is Randy Shilts' "And the Band Played On," written in the late 1980s. However, lots of research has shown that HIV was in some American's blood much earlier, in fact decades earlier. And it wasn't until 1981 that the US Center for Disease Control first noted a rare cancer was cropping up in a small number of gay men. The free-wheeling sex revolution for gay guys lasted well into 1982.

Third, shouldn't Mahler have discussed the disconnect between (1) the fact that cops shot hundreds of bullets on the night of the blackout and beat pedestrians over the head until they were bloody, and (2) the city's official reports that the cops used utmost restraint and didn't fire a single round? He mentions both facts but doesn't offer any analysis. The final impression, at the end of the section on the great blackout, is that the looters were evil but the police were angels.

In these ways, I wish Mahler had put more care into the book.

On the plus side, it's nice to read once again that Ed Koch was a slimeball, even during the days of his campaign. He used Bess Myerson for a beard, he racial baited, and he reneged on his previous support of discriminated-against groups.

I'll be honest -- I never expected to read this book. I'm a Red Sox fan and have disliked the Yankees all my life. Also, I found the incessant commercials for the ESPN miniseries extremely annoying and planned to avoid it, too. I'm also not particularly fond of New York City.

As it turned out, however, I attended a CT Defenders minor-league baseball game (Norwich, CT) and the author was there signing copies of the paperback version. After talking to him about it, I decided to buy one.

I was hooked by the end of the preface. Mr. Mahler is an excellent writer, and he tells several interweaving stories simultaneously, each of which drew me into the world of 1977 New York. At that time, I was just a high school student in Pennsylvania. It's fascinating to have a window into the events of that time from an historical perspective. It's amazing to watch the early NY careers of Ed Koch, Mario Cuomo, Rupert Murdoch, Billy Martin, Reggie Jackson, and even George Steinbrenner as they developed. I also very much enjoyed learning the details of the New York blackout that year, as well as the Son of Sam killings. The diversions into the growth of both disco and punk were also highly entertaining.

In short, I couldn't put it down. The book is easily worth four stars. The only reason I hesitate on the fifth star is that at times the author maintains an almost clinical detachment from the events being described. This is especially true in the material about the blackout. I assume that is due to the author's newspaper background, though I could be wrong about that.

Still, I highly recommend the book to anyone, whether they are Yankee fans , New York fans, or neither. It's a lot of fun and great snapshot of an era.

This book was everything you want in literary non-fiction. It was incredibly interesting, fast-paced, hilarious, heart-breaking, and informative all at the same time. My only complaint would be that it is too short. I kept wanting him to go into more detail and elaborating on each plot-line he touched (the blackout particularly). Mahler's biggest accomplishment was showing the many different sides of his flawed heroes with some compassion and no judgment. He gives both the good and bad of Reggie Jackson, Billy Martin, Abe Beam, Ed Koch, Mario Cuomo, Rupert Murdoch, George Steinbrenner, the journalists for the Post and Daily News, the cops and looters on the night of the blackout, even Jimmy Carter.

A great read on a fascinating piece of New York history.

This book brought back memories from my youth growing up in New York city at that time. It also enlightened me in that I did not realize how big of a year 1977 was for New York. I felt at times using the Yankees was a stretch but being a huge Yankee fan then it did not bother me, but may bother others.

New York City of 1977 was a very different place from New York City today, and, as an entertainment business, Major League Baseball was in its infancy, although the game itself has changed only moderately. I was a 16-year old New Yorker that summer, and for those with my profile---bred in NYC, baseball fans, now of a certain age---this masterful book is an unceasing pleasure.

It is really two books: one, a social history of New York City in that year---featuring the blackout, Son of Sam and the mayoral election (Abzug, Beame, Cuomo, Kotch and more--an all-star cast from the past) as the main events around which the time and place are evoked. The other book is the story of the soap opera that was the 1977 Yankees, a.k.a., the Bronx Zoo.

Both books within this book (and the tale jumps back and forth between the two, with little integration) are honestly, accurately rendered. This is really what New York City was like that year (as well as the Yankees). In truth, it was not a happy time, and Mahler's rendition neither softens it with a nostalgic lens nor exaggerates its harrowing moments. It is just true. And, if you lived it, I think you will greatly enjoy this trip back.

Because the two aspects of the book--social history and baseball story--are so independent, I might not recommend this book to someone not interested in both. Nonbaseball fans will be bored with the Yankee machinations, and for those looking for a "baseball book," this aint it. A finally caveat is that the material is so much a part of my own experience, that I'm not sure how much I was filling in blanks or investing passages with emotion from my own mind. A friend of mine whom I would have expected to greatly enjoy the book rated it as O.K.---but my friend is from California.

For a recreation of that time and place, however, this book is superb. And make no mistake, New York City in 1977 was no ordinary time and place. I certainly wouldn't have the City go back to those days of muggings and head shops and disco, which was also the launch point for punk rock and, tragically, for AIDS in this country. But there was a certain grittiness and (dark) form of "aliveness" that no longer exists in the Starbucks world. So enjoy this guided tour through the not-so-distant past.

(This review was written days before the launch of ESPN's miniseries of the book and about a year after I read it. The advance reviews I've seen of the miniseries are ominous. It the series stinks, don't let that deter you from the book).

THIS BOOK CHRONICLED 1977 IN NEW YORK CITY. IT COVERED THE MAYORAL RACE, THE LOCAL NEWSPAPERS, THE YANKEES, THE SON OF SAM AND THE BLACKOUT. AS A YOUNG BOY GROWING UP IN NEW YORK CITY DURING 1977 I HAVE HAZY RECOLLECTIONS OF ALL OF THE TOPICS COVERED IN THIS BOOK. I REALLY ENJOYED GOING BACK 30 YEARS AND RELIVING THESE INCIDENTS. IT'S AMAZING THAT ALL OF THIS HAPPENED IN ONE YEAR IN ONE US CITY. THIS IS AN EXCELLENT BOOK THAT COVERS SOME GREAT AND INFAMOUS EVENTS. I MOST ENJOYED THE SECTIONS ON THE BLACKOUT AND THE SON OF SAM. THE PARTS ON THE YANKEES GAVE AN INSIDE LOOK AT THE TURBULENT TIMES SURROUNDING REGGIE JACKSON AND BILLY MARTIN. IT IS AN EASY READ THAT I HAD TROUBLE PUTTING DOWN.

A year in the life of NYC, 1977 as the title tells us, and a pretty interesting year to observe. The social and political and economic unrest were at levels we have almost forgotten, and even more have we forgotten the cumulative sense that this was destiny. The rising murder rate, the Son of Sam in particular, the riots and social anarchy and growing crime and grime rate all seemed like an inexorable march to decay in 1977, and Mahler dissertates well on this.

Much like "The Devil in the White City", this book tries to tie several disparate topics together in somewhat unnatural ways, but overall the reader is able to follow and the stories flow well. I'm not a Yankees fan, but I was able to generate interest in the Reggie Jackson Billy Martin conflict that was a highlight, and microcosm, of the Yankees and New York in 1977.
Finally we had the story of the surprise win of Ed Koch in the mayoral election over Mario Cuomo. Koch is always an interesting figure, and more could've been spent on this and on Koch for my part, although he was just developing as a character in those days. And who other than a New Yorker would've remembered that Bella Abzug was a major player in those days. New York is definitely a different town than it was in 1977. I know it's a city, but it's also a hell of a town.

I found this book facinating. First of all, I love New York and am sometimes sorry I relocated to the West Coast. But, back to the book. Who would have guessed that so many events occured in one city in one year? Mahler gives it his all from the Yankees, the mayor race, the blackout to the Son of Sam.It reads like a good novel. You hate to put it down. The book makes me want to subscribe to the New York Times.Whether you are a New Yorker or not, you'll enjoy this book. GO YANKEES.

As its back cover states, Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx Is Burning is literally "a kaleidoscopic portrait of New York City in 1977," as Jonathan Mahler ambitiously weaves together New York City's major stories of that surprisingly pivotal year -- the Yankees turmoil-filled championship season; the divisive mayoral race; the illuminating blackout; and the "Son of Sam" killer; among several other low-profile but similarly influential events -- into a dizzying collage that is ever-so-slightly less than the sum of its parts. The flaw is not in his writing, which is crisp and insightful, but in the discordant structuring of his story's numerous threads, and the often awkward or completely non-existent segues between them.

Mahler acknowledges in the introduction that the City simply refused to remain in the background of what was intended to be a tale of the Yankees incredible, raucous run to the Championship, and as a result, his fractured account of the year ends on a bit of an anti-climactic note. Nevertheless, the joy is in the journey and he takes the scenic route, offering an impressive overview of a landmark year in the life of the City that never sleeps that came precariously close putting it down for the count.

Being the same age as Mahler, and having lived ten blocks northeast of Yankee Stadium during the period covered, his tale is an enthralling mix of nostalgic flashbacks, unlocked memories and revelatory clarifications from my own childhood. Highly recommended!

In 1977 I was a 17 year old die-hard Yankees fan and an incoming NYU freshman residing at the dorms in Greenwich Village.What a time and an age to be in NYC.The events of 1977 are brought back in vivid detail by Mahler for me to enjoy (the Yankees season, the music scene),to revisit(the unforgettable summer of Sam)and to relearn(the politics and social issues).The book is not just a baseball season history,but a reliving of 1977 in NYC in an entertaining and educational fashion.I even vividly remember cursing at Howard Cosell(which I often did) when he uttered the line in the title(the Bronx is burning) during the World Series telecast.It's all there.I loved this book.

I am from the NY area but was only 12in 1977. It is interesting to re-live the time from an adult's perspective. Mr. Mahler makes this easy because he does a great job of bringing the city and all of the players into full view. It is one of the best books I have read in a long time

The 1970s was not a great time for major cities nationwide. It was a point where the optimism generated from The Great Society came crashing down, the racial divide became cavernous and urban decay was a standard of living.

New York City swallowed the bitter pill in 1977 with a citywide power outage and massive looting that followed, a mayoral campaign long on oftentimes nasty rhetoric but short on tangible solutions, the Son of Sam murders and an emerging style of newspaper reporting of style over substance. And before I forget, there was the diamond opera of George, Billy & Reggie in "The House That Ruth Built."

Author Jonathan Mahler does a spectacular job in weaving so many storylines in a concise history of a city in crisis. It is highly readable and moves with a swift pace of a novel and again shows how fact is stranger than fiction when politics ambles to home plate and egos are larger than simple commonsense.

Every once in a while you have a book that you just have to keep reading. This is one of them. I knew nothing about baseball, but knew Reggie Jackson from Topps trading cards I used to have when I was a kid. I knew nothing about the Blackout of '77, Abe Beam the Mayor before Koch, how Cuomo almost became mayor, that Abzug was a politician instead of a Mad Magazine character, and that the West Side Highway was closed and crumbling... My wife loved it too. Recommended!

a World series title for the Bronx
I am old enough to remember New York of the mid Seventies (1975-1977). During that time I remember the fiscal crisis of 1975 (my father was laid off from his teaching position CUNY), the bicentennial celebration (I was in Newport,Rhode Island at the time), the Democratic Convention (The first political convention I watched on TV), The 1977 Yankees (I attended my first baseball game at Yankee Stadium that year), the Blackout (My father had to find me in the darkness as he did in 1965 when I was about 2 years old) and the mayor's race (my Mom and Dad backed first Percy Sutton, then Mario Cuomo, then Ed Koch).

The reader will get a glimpse how the events in 1977 where shaped by the fiscal crisis of 1975; how the bicentennial and the Democratic Convention hightened New Yorkers expectations of Jimmy Carter after Ford nixed a bailot (Daily News headline :Ford to City: Drop Dead). In addition, they will see personal political rivalries, racial and ethnic aspirations and intergroup tensions fueled the 1977 mayor's race. How David Berkowitz (Son of Sam killer) and The Blackout led to the election of Ed Koch as mayor. Finally, the reader will read how Billy Martin, Reggie Jackson, Thurman Munson, Catfish Hunter, Sparky Lyle and George Steinbrenner brought a World Series title to the Bronx.