Famed New York City bookstore the Strand has allegedly been hosing down homeless people with its sprinkler system in an effort to discourage them from sleeping beneath its trademark red awning overnight. Jesus Christ. We thought reading was supposed to make you more empathetic.

The Times has sent critic Dwight Garner on a literary tour of New York in order to answer novelist Gary Shteyngart's immortal question, Can New Yorkers still throw a good party with only a bottle of shampoo? The answer appears to be "maybe," if you are in Brooklyn and allowed to smoke and are also in a coffee shop.

The Strand, the humongous New York bookstore by Union Square that is like one of the biggest used book stores ever of all time, has always attracted lots of young workers who take the low pay in exchange for the cool factor of working at the place, and the chance to be around books all day. One negative: the store…

Tina Brown's book The Diana Chronicles is perched prettily atop the New York Times Hardcover Nonfiction bestseller list. (Take that, Chris Hitchens!) All Tina's careful plans have gone exactly right. So if one takes as a given that Tina Brown is the queen of intentionality, her decision to have a discussion with …

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