Letter from New York

Manderley Press is delighted to announce the publication of a brand-new edition of Helene Hanff’s Letter from New York – another literary jewel from the author of 84, Charing Cross Road.

To showcase this wonderful book, we commissioned the New York Times bestselling author Jean Hanff Korelitz (The Plot)  to pen a new introduction – she is a cousin of Helene Hanff’s, and was inspired to become a writer after meeting her as a teenager. The front cover was specially designed by New Yorker illustrator Bruce Eric Kaplan, also a fan of the author and a resident of New York City too.

Over several years, Helene Hanff read aloud these stories of her life in New York for BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour. This book is a collection of selected scripts from this series, composed with a British audience in mind, in which the author offers us a glimpse into her own everyday tales of the city.

Written in her trademark whimsical and upbeat style, Helene Hanff transports us right to the heart of Manhattan in the 1980s, describing her favourite places, people and pets with gentle humour, and introducing the reader to the ups and downs of life in a high-rise apartment building in New York City (“the last small town in America”).

We are introduced to Bentley, the Old English Sheepdog belonging to a neighbour who captured the author’s heart; we take a stroll through the beautiful Shakespeare’s Garden in Central Park; and we join the author to enjoy annual city parades down Fifth Avenue – especially the St Patrick’s Day parade, when the whole of New York turned green.

And we meet Helene’s friends: Arlene, whose glamorous social life – and wardrobe – puts Hanff’s tiny apartment and simple writer’s life into perspective, and Nina, whose garden on the sixteenth-floor overflows with flowers and fruit trees. Finally, we accompany the author as she travels to London to celebrate the opening night of the dramatisation of her best-selling book 84, Charing Cross Road.

What started out as a six-month trial in 1978 eventually turned into a six-year project, during which time Helene Hanff captivated radio audiences with her monthly broadcasts – each one a love letter to her beloved NYC.

Long before the cast of Friends – and Sarah Jessica Parker’s iconic evocation of life in the city –  recreated a New York existence for us to experience vicariously, these 5-minute vignettes were the perfect way for native New Yorkers and international readers alike, to revel in the quotidian as well as the glamour of city life, and to discover the unexpected hidden gems – and treasured traditions – of New York City.

Letter from New York is still a delight to read, 40 years after it was first written – a timeless and beguiling tale of everyday life in this great city, by one of the best-loved authors of the 20th-century.

Helene Hanff (1916–97) was an American author, journalist and playwright, who captured the hearts of readers everywhere with her book 84, Charing Cross Road – an account of her love affair with an antiquarian bookshop in London. She was born in Philadelphia but moved to her adopted city of New York, where she studied playwriting and wrote scripts for live television. Later she penned articles for The New Yorker and Harper’s magazines before becoming the author of books for adults and children. The New York apartment building where she lived and wrote at 305 E. 72nd Street has been named ‘Charing Cross House’ in her honour and a bronze plaque next to the front door celebrates her residence; in London a matching plaque on the site of the original building commemorates the bookshop at 84, Charing Cross Road.

Jean Hanff Korelitz was born and raised in New York and graduated from Dartmouth College and Clare College, Cambridge. She is a New York Times bestselling author (The Plot, The Latecomer, Admission), and several of her novels have been adapted for film and television. She has also written a collection of poetry, a novel for middle grade readers and adapted James Joyce’s The Dead for the theatre. Korelitz is also the founder of Book The Writer – a New York City-based pop-up book group where readers discuss books in person with their authors.
www.jeanhanffkorelitz.com

Bruce Eric Kaplan is an American cartoonist whose single-panel illustrations are frequently published in The New Yorker. His signature style is distinctive and off-beat – often combining dark humour with deceptively simple illustration. Kaplan is also a screenwriter and producer (working on television series Six Feet Under, Girls and Seinfeld too), and has written and illustrated books for both adults and children.