Literary Brooklyn: A Real Life Tour of 10 Fictional Brooklyn Places
“Walter had festooned St. Pauls’s front doors with evergreen garlands and the little statue of the Holy Mother wore a holly wreath around her head. Mary opened the iron side gate; the metal was cold on her fingers and she walked the icy path.”
Milk, Darcey Steinke
This small book (I’ve never been sure if it’s a novella, or just three long, short stories connected together) is a beautiful meditation on love and sex and faith and life, and it all happens in Brooklyn. While many Brooklyn places are given their due, St. Paul’s church on Carroll Street is a focal point for all the characters. While not as imposing at the Most Holy Trinity church of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, the beauty of this building is undeniable. Plus, even in the dwindling summer days, holly grows outside the church’s walls, evoking the wreath that graces the head of the Holy Mother statue in the book.
