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This week, don’t miss an oral history of New York’s biggest films, an illustrated guide to its pickles, and a portrait of its transformation during World War II

By Jim Kelly

Do not pick up this book if you have to be someplace in an hour, because you won’t make it there. Michael Lee Nirenberg has put together an oral history of New York films and TV shows by the crew members that shot, lit, designed, and miked dozens of productions, from The French Connection to Network toThe Sopranos, and it is as addictive as the coke that James Gandolfini apparently consumed while playing Tony Soprano. You will learn that Sidney Lumet was considered the best director to work with, that the famed Steadicam shot in Goodfellas of Ray Liotta and Lorraine Bracco walking into the Copacabana through the kitchen took at least 15 meticulously choreographed takes, and that Michael Jackson as the Scarecrow in READ ON