...Like many Americans, I fear living in a nowhere, in a place that is no-place; in Brooklyn, that doesn't trouble me at all. Everybody, it seems, is here. At Grand Army Plaza, I have seen traffic tie-ups caused by Haitians and others rallying in support of President Aristide and by St. Patrick's Day parades…Local taxis have bumper stickers that say 'Allah Is Great'; one of the men who made the bomb that blew up the World Trade Center used an apartment just a few blocks from me....

American essayist and humorist. Born in Hudson, Ohio, Frazier studied at Western Reserve Academy and Harvard University, where he cut his teeth as a humorist at the satirical Harvard Lampoon. Since his graduation from Harvard in 1973 many of his humorous pieces have appeared first in the New Yorker and then been collected in such volumes as Dating Your Mom (1986), Coyote v. Acme (1996), and Lamentations of the Father (2008). Frazier's best-known work of nonfiction is Great Plains (1989); like the autobiographical Family (1994) and On the Rez (2000), it is based on both extensive research and his own experiences after moving to Montana in 1982. Since relocating with his family to the East Coast he has published Gone to New York: Adventures in the City (2005). See also us.macmillan.com/ author/ianfrazier.