Slice Harvester: A Memoir in Pizza

Hagendorf’s popular Slice Harvester blog chronicled his quest to eat and review a slice of cheese pizza from every pizzeria in Manhattan. In this entertaining memoir, he mashes up that journey with the topics of addiction, family, punk rock, nostalgia, and love. Hagendorf’s love affair with pizza and New York City started when his father brought him to the Lower East Side in the 1990s to buy his first pair of Doc Martens, and ever since then the two had been intertwined in his mind. Fifteen years later, after completing a two-year odyssey of pizza-eating, Hagendorf turned his affection for his adopted hometown and his taste for cheese, sauce, and crust into a personal self-improvement plan. Full of drinking binges, colorful characters from the punk scene, and random asides like comparing a slice to Anthony Kiedis, the narrative takes readers on a roller-coaster ride that leaves them wondering whether Hagendorf can continue this fast pace, or find a positive way to harness all his frenetic energy. Thankfully, with the help of his friend Christina, who has a “shaved head [and] dark eyes” and “dressed like a total freak,” he is able to get his act together and complete his culinary adventure. Along with his own story, Hagendorf nicely captures the evolution of some of the city’s neighborhoods and their pizza joints. (Aug.)