Book excerpt: Packed with information, savvy insights, and surprising facts, this guide to Dylan’s years in New York City examines the role that the city played in the creation of his music, the evolution of his creative process, and the continual reinvention of his public persona. In the landscape of Manhattan, Dylan created words and sounds that redefined the possibilities of popular music throughout the world. Chronicling where he lived, worked, and played, this book offers an evocative portrait of the city, especially its folk scene during the 1960s. With street maps featuring more than 50 sites—from fleabag hotels and avant-garde clubs to tiny coffeehouses and vast concert halls—readers can navigate Bob Dylan’s New York and experience the sites and sounds that influenced the singer, such as Café Wha?; the Chelsea Hotel; Columbia’s Studio A, where he recorded songs such as “Desolation Row” and “Positively 4th Street;” the Decker Building, where he hung out with Andy Warhol and Nico; the Delmonico Hotel, where he introduced the Beatles to marijuana; and the Bitter End, where he spent much of the summer of 1975 playing pool and guitar.