I came across a new reprint of Mark Alan Stamaty’s classic Who Needs Donuts? while browsing through the Brookline Booksmith last night. What a great book – I’d forgotten about it, but immediately recognized it and remembered what strange, scarily detailed illustrations it has, and how I got a sort of nightmarish yet alluring image of New York City from that book. The city was a place where things were peddled on the streets, weird horse-birds flew through the skies, and old women lived alone in “Home Sad Home” underground apartments, ever in danger of being flooded with coffee from punctured vats, but could eventually be saved by resourceful kids and lots of porous donuts. Brilliant.