Sunshine Crust Baking Factory

The author of Not for Rent—a cult classic book about squatting—“now vividly fictionalizes the experience . . . with empathy and insight” (Booklist).   Sid arrives in New York City in 1995 eager to join the anarchist squatting scene. She’s got a tattoo, she listens to the right bands . . . so why would she get a job and rent some tiny shoe-box apartment when she could take over a whole building with a gang of wild young pirates? But the Lower East Side is changing; there are no more empty buildings, the squats are cliquey and full. Sid teams up with a musician from Mexico and together they find their way across the bridge to Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Packs of wild dogs roam the waterfront and the rough building in which they finally find space is occupied by misfits who don’t know anything about the Manhattan squatting scene, Food Not Bombs, Critical Mass, or hardcore punk. But this is Sid’s chance and she’s determined to make a home for herself—no matter what. Wakefield spent years living in squatted buildings in Europe and New York and brings firsthand knowledge to Sid’s story. The Sunshine Crust Baking Factory is “a celebration of the do-it-yourself living ethos that allowed many punks to live communally in New York City at the end of the last century, but it is also a cautionary tale about the struggles of trying to get along when living in large groups” (The Brooklyn Paper).  Nominated for the Brooklyn Public Library’s Brooklyn Eagles Literary Prize for FictionOne of The L Magazine’s 50 Books You’ll Want to Read This Spring and Summer