"A riveting portrayal of everyday life at the jail. The authors' unhurried cataloging of seemingly endless quotidian deprivations fascinates. Readers will be rapt." (Publishers Weekly, STARRED) "Engrossing, intimate... [ Campbell and Shanahan] are deft and balanced collaborators, writing with academic rigor, as well as humor and compassion." (Kirkus Reviews) "David Campbell and Jarrod Shanahan offer an up-close study of the banality and brutality of short-term incarceration at Rikers Island. Their methodical analysis of the relationships, routines, economies, and architectures of the infamous jail is punctuated by vibrant and evocative insights into the sensory experience of incarceration the smells, sights, sounds and tastes of the quotidian depravities, degradations, frictions, and resistances that marked their 'city time.'" (Judah Schept, co-author of The Jail is Everywhere: Fighting the New Geography of Mass Incarceration) "As Rikers Island notorious jail is on the verge of closing, City Time provides a timely and invaluable archive written by two men who have experienced its everyday life from inside. This exceptional document, which unveils the meaninglessness of short-stay imprisonment, is a must-read for anyone who wants to reflect on carceral punishment." (Didier Fassin, author of Prison Worlds. An Ethnography of the Carceral Condition) "City Time serves as a how-to manual for maintaining one's humanity in the face of the constant repression and mundanity of life on Rikers Island.. [ and] will stand as a testament to the often arbitrary and needlessly brutal ways that the criminal legal system has sought to control and suppress marginalized populations and those willing and able to fight back." (Inquest) "Perhaps a copy of City Time for Eric Adams is in order." (Public Seminar)
