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City Books
Showing 1-50 of 5,870
The Death and Life of Great American Cities (Hardcover)
by (shelved 28 times as city)
avg rating 4.29 — 20,754 ratings — published 1961
City of Bones (The Mortal Instruments, #1)
by (shelved 27 times as city)
avg rating 4.06 — 2,209,575 ratings — published 2007
Last Stop on Market Street (Hardcover)
by (shelved 24 times as city)
avg rating 4.31 — 19,002 ratings — published 2015
Angels & Demons (Robert Langdon, #1)
by (shelved 23 times as city)
avg rating 3.96 — 3,451,269 ratings — published 2000
City Shapes (Hardcover)
by (shelved 23 times as city)
avg rating 3.83 — 726 ratings — published 2016
Nana in the City (Nana, #1)
by (shelved 23 times as city)
avg rating 4.10 — 2,875 ratings — published 2014
When You Reach Me (Hardcover)
by (shelved 21 times as city)
avg rating 4.08 — 118,495 ratings — published 2009
Imperial Bedrooms (Paperback)
by (shelved 18 times as city)
avg rating 3.20 — 21,395 ratings — published 2010
Happy City: Transforming Our Lives Through Urban Design (Hardcover)
by (shelved 17 times as city)
avg rating 4.35 — 9,782 ratings — published 2012
Blackout (Hardcover)
by (shelved 17 times as city)
avg rating 4.15 — 11,174 ratings — published 2011
Walkable City: How Downtown Can Save America, One Step at a Time (Hardcover)
by (shelved 16 times as city)
avg rating 4.31 — 9,082 ratings — published 2012
City of Ashes (The Mortal Instruments, #2)
by (shelved 16 times as city)
avg rating 4.10 — 1,009,434 ratings — published 2008
’Salem’s Lot (Paperback)
by (shelved 16 times as city)
avg rating 4.10 — 681,377 ratings — published 1975
City of Glass (The Mortal Instruments, #3)
by (shelved 15 times as city)
avg rating 4.27 — 1,027,549 ratings — published 2009
Invisible Cities (Paperback)
by (shelved 15 times as city)
avg rating 4.09 — 101,642 ratings — published 1972
Cities for People (Hardcover)
by (shelved 14 times as city)
avg rating 4.35 — 2,508 ratings — published 2010
Little Elliot, Big City (Little Elliot, #1)
by (shelved 14 times as city)
avg rating 4.19 — 2,498 ratings — published 2014
The Image of the City (Paperback)
by (shelved 14 times as city)
avg rating 4.05 — 4,284 ratings — published 1960
Ulysses (Paperback)
by (shelved 14 times as city)
avg rating 3.76 — 141,225 ratings — published 1922
My City Speaks (Hardcover)
by (shelved 13 times as city)
avg rating 4.17 — 705 ratings — published 2021
Small in the City (Hardcover)
by (shelved 13 times as city)
avg rating 4.21 — 1,968 ratings — published 2019
City of Fallen Angels (The Mortal Instruments, #4)
by (shelved 12 times as city)
avg rating 4.07 — 649,590 ratings — published 2011
The Goldfinch (Hardcover)
by (shelved 11 times as city)
avg rating 3.97 — 1,077,481 ratings — published 2013
City of Lost Souls (The Mortal Instruments, #5)
by (shelved 11 times as city)
avg rating 4.20 — 575,107 ratings — published 2012
The Catcher in the Rye (Paperback)
by (shelved 10 times as city)
avg rating 3.80 — 3,995,153 ratings — published 1951
Maybe Something Beautiful: How Art Transformed a Neighborhood (Hardcover)
by (shelved 10 times as city)
avg rating 4.27 — 3,128 ratings — published 2016
Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier and Happier (Hardcover)
by (shelved 10 times as city)
avg rating 3.91 — 6,494 ratings — published 2011
The Bonfire of the Vanities (Paperback)
by (shelved 10 times as city)
avg rating 3.93 — 89,170 ratings — published 1987
My Block Looks Like (Kindle Edition)
by (shelved 9 times as city)
avg rating 4.17 — 346 ratings — published
Sidewalk Flowers (Hardcover)
by (shelved 9 times as city)
avg rating 4.23 — 4,141 ratings — published 2015
The City Tree: An Inspiring Story About How Kindness and Community Transform Urban Neighborhoods for Kids (Ages 4-8)
by (shelved 9 times as city)
avg rating 4.09 — 316 ratings — published
Everybody in the Red Brick Building: A Rhythmic Bedtime Story About Noisy Neighbors for Children (Ages 4–8)
by (shelved 9 times as city)
avg rating 4.02 — 850 ratings — published 2021
The City We Became (Great Cities, #1)
by (shelved 9 times as city)
avg rating 3.83 — 80,645 ratings — published 2020
The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America (Hardcover)
by (shelved 9 times as city)
avg rating 4.00 — 779,565 ratings — published 2003
The Little House (Hardcover)
by (shelved 9 times as city)
avg rating 4.30 — 42,670 ratings — published 1942
The Bear Ate Your Sandwich (Hardcover)
by (shelved 9 times as city)
avg rating 4.12 — 4,208 ratings — published 2015
Have You Seen My Dragon? (Hardcover)
by (shelved 9 times as city)
avg rating 3.96 — 2,256 ratings — published 2014
Tap Tap Boom Boom (Hardcover)
by (shelved 9 times as city)
avg rating 3.55 — 964 ratings — published 2014
Make Way for Ducklings (Hardcover)
by (shelved 9 times as city)
avg rating 4.25 — 91,572 ratings — published 1941
Let the Great World Spin (Hardcover)
by (shelved 9 times as city)
avg rating 3.96 — 111,696 ratings — published 2009
Boogie Boogie, Y'all (Hardcover)
by (shelved 8 times as city)
avg rating 3.77 — 515 ratings — published 2021
The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York (Paperback)
by (shelved 8 times as city)
avg rating 4.53 — 31,260 ratings — published 1974
All Through My Town (Hardcover)
by (shelved 8 times as city)
avg rating 3.72 — 452 ratings — published 2013
City of Quartz: Excavating the Future in Los Angeles (Vintage)
by (shelved 8 times as city)
avg rating 4.21 — 5,046 ratings — published 1990
“Are You Ready for New Urban Fragrances?
Yeah, I guess I'm ready, but listen:
Perfume is a disguise. Since the middle ages, we have worn masks of fruit and flowers in order to conceal from ourselves the meaty essence of our humanity. We appreciate the sexual attractant of the rose, the ripeness of the orange, more than we honor our own ripe carnality.
Now today we want to perfume our cities, as well; to replace their stinging fumes of disturbed fossils' sleep with the scent of gardens and orchards. Yet, humans are not bees any more than they are blossoms. If we must pull an olfactory hood over our urban environment, let it be of a different nature.
I want to travel on a train that smells like snowflakes.
I want to sip in cafes that smell like comets.
Under the pressure of my step, I want the streets to emit the precise odor of a diamond necklace.
I want the newspapers I read to smell like the violins left in pawnshops by weeping hobos on Christmas Eve.
I want to carry luggage that reeks of the neurons in Einstein's brain.
I want a city's gases to smell like the golden belly hairs of the gods.
And when I gaze at a televised picture of the moon, I want to detect, from a distance of 239,000 miles, the aroma of fresh mozzarella.”
― Wild Ducks Flying Backward
Yeah, I guess I'm ready, but listen:
Perfume is a disguise. Since the middle ages, we have worn masks of fruit and flowers in order to conceal from ourselves the meaty essence of our humanity. We appreciate the sexual attractant of the rose, the ripeness of the orange, more than we honor our own ripe carnality.
Now today we want to perfume our cities, as well; to replace their stinging fumes of disturbed fossils' sleep with the scent of gardens and orchards. Yet, humans are not bees any more than they are blossoms. If we must pull an olfactory hood over our urban environment, let it be of a different nature.
I want to travel on a train that smells like snowflakes.
I want to sip in cafes that smell like comets.
Under the pressure of my step, I want the streets to emit the precise odor of a diamond necklace.
I want the newspapers I read to smell like the violins left in pawnshops by weeping hobos on Christmas Eve.
I want to carry luggage that reeks of the neurons in Einstein's brain.
I want a city's gases to smell like the golden belly hairs of the gods.
And when I gaze at a televised picture of the moon, I want to detect, from a distance of 239,000 miles, the aroma of fresh mozzarella.”
― Wild Ducks Flying Backward
“Those shining stars, he liked to point out, were one of the special treats for people like us who lived out in the wilderness. Rich city folks, he'd say, lived in fancy apartments, but their air was so polluted they couldn't even see the stars. We'd have to be out of our minds to want to trade places with any of them.”
― The Glass Castle
― The Glass Castle


















