The Tender Bar

Author: J. R. Moehringer
Publisher: Hachette Books
ISBN: 1401383416
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 531

Book Description
Now a major Amazon film directed by George Clooney and starring Ben Affleck, Tye Sheridan, Lily Rabe, and Christopher Lloyd, a raucous, poignant, luminously written memoir about a boy striving to become a man, and his romance with a bar, in the tradition of This Boy’s Life and The Liar’s Club—with a new Afterword. J.R. Moehringer grew up captivated by a voice. It was the voice of his father, a New York City disc jockey who vanished before J.R. spoke his first word. Sitting on the stoop, pressing an ear to the radio, J.R. would strain to hear in that plummy baritone the secrets of masculinity and identity. Though J.R.'s mother was his world, his rock, he craved something more, something faintly and hauntingly audible only in The Voice. At eight years old, suddenly unable to find The Voice on the radio, J.R. turned in desperation to the bar on the corner, where he found a rousing chorus of new voices. The alphas along the bar—including J.R.'s Uncle Charlie, a Humphrey Bogart look-alike; Colt, a Yogi Bear sound-alike; and Joey D, a softhearted brawler—took J.R. to the beach, to ballgames, and ultimately into their circle. They taught J.R., tended him, and provided a kind of fathering-by-committee. Torn between the stirring example of his mother and the lurid romance of the bar, J.R. tried to forge a self somewhere in the center. But when it was time for J.R. to leave home, the bar became an increasingly seductive sanctuary, a place to return and regroup during his picaresque journeys. Time and again the bar offered shelter from failure, rejection, heartbreak—and eventually from reality. In the grand tradition of landmark memoirs, The Tender Bar is suspenseful, wrenching, and achingly funny. A classic American story of self-invention and escape, of the fierce love between a single mother and an only son, it's also a moving portrait of one boy's struggle to become a man, and an unforgettable depiction of how men remain, at heart, lost boys. Named a best book of the year by The New York Times, Esquire, The Los Angeles Times Book Review, Entertainment Weekly, USA Today, NPR's "Fresh Air," and New York Magazine A New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Wall Street Journal, San Francisco Chronicle, USA Today, Booksense, and Library Journal Bestseller Booksense Pick Borders New Voices Finalist Winner of the Books for a Better Life First Book Award

Sutton

Author: J. R. Moehringer
Publisher: Hachette Books
ISBN: 140130477X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 304

Book Description
"What Hilary Mantel did for Thomas Cromwell and Paula McLain for Hadley Hemingway . . . Moehringer does for bank robber Willie Sutton" in this fascinating biographical novel of America's most successful bank robber (Newsday). Willie Sutton was born in the Irish slums of Brooklyn in 1901, and he came of age at a time when banks were out of control. Sutton saw only one way out and only one way to win the girl of his dreams. So began the career of America's most successful bank robber. During three decades Sutton became so good at breaking into banks, the FBI put him on its first-ever Most Wanted List. But the public rooted for the criminal who never fired a shot, and when Sutton was finally caught for good, crowds at the jail chanted his name. In J.R. Moehringer's retelling, it was more than need or rage that drove Sutton. It was his first love. And when he finally walked free -- a surprise pardon on Christmas Eve, 1969 -- he immediately set out to find her. "Electrifying." --Booklist (starred) "Thoroughly absorbing . . . Filled with vibrant and colorful re-creations of not one but several times in the American past." --Kevin Baker, author of Strivers Row "[J.R. Moehringer] has found an historical subject equal to his vivid imagination, gimlet journalistic eye, and pitch-perfect ear for dialogue. By turns suspenseful, funny, romantic, and sad--in short, a book you won't be able to put down." --John Burnham Schwartz, author of Reservation Road and The Commoner

The Yellow Birds

Author: Kevin Powers
Publisher: Little, Brown
ISBN: 0316219355
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 173

Book Description
Finalist for the National Book Award, The Yellow Birds is the harrowing story of two young soldiers trying to stay alive in Iraq. "The war tried to kill us in the spring." So begins this powerful account of friendship and loss. In Al Tafar, Iraq, twenty-one-year old Private Bartle and eighteen-year-old Private Murphy cling to life as their platoon launches a bloody battle for the city. Bound together since basic training when Bartle makes a promise to bring Murphy safely home, the two have been dropped into a war neither is prepared for. In the endless days that follow, the two young soldiers do everything to protect each other from the forces that press in on every side: the insurgents, physical fatigue, and the mental stress that comes from constant danger. As reality begins to blur into a hazy nightmare, Murphy becomes increasingly unmoored from the world around him and Bartle takes actions he could never have imagined. With profound emotional insight, especially into the effects of a hidden war on mothers and families at home, The Yellow Birds is a groundbreaking novel that is destined to become a classic.

Tender at the Bone

Author: Ruth Reichl
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 0679604200
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 322

Book Description
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “An absolute delight to read . . . How lucky we are that [Ruth Reichl] had the courage to follow her appetite.”—Newsday At an early age, Ruth Reichl discovered that “food could be a way of making sense of the world. If you watched people as they ate, you could find out who they were.” Her deliciously crafted memoir Tender at the Bone is the story of a life defined, determined, and enhanced in equal measure by a passion for food, by unforgettable people, and by the love of tales well told. Beginning with her mother, the notorious food-poisoner known as the Queen of Mold, Reichl introduces us to the fascinating characters who shaped her world and tastes, from the gourmand Monsieur du Croix, who served Reichl her first foie gras, to those at her politically correct table in Berkeley who championed the organic food revolution in the 1970s. Spiced with Reichl’s infectious humor and sprinkled with her favorite recipes, Tender at the Bone is a witty and compelling chronicle of a culinary sensualist’s coming-of-age. BONUS: This edition includes an excerpt from Ruth Reichl's Delicious! Praise for Tender at the Bone “A poignant, yet hilarious, collection of stories about people [Reichl] has known and loved, and who, knowingly or unknowingly, steered her on the path to fulfill her destiny as one of the world’s leading food writers.”—Chicago Sun-Times “While all good food writers are humorous . . . few are so riotously, effortlessly entertaining as Ruth Reichl.”—The New York Times Book Review “Reading Ruth Reichl on food is almost as good as eating it. . . . Reichl makes the reader feel present with her, sharing the experience.”—Washington Post Book World “[In] this lovely memoir . . . we find young Ruth desperately trying to steer her manic mother's unwary guests toward something edible. It's a job she does now . . . in her columns, and whose intimate imperatives she illuminates in this graceful book.”—The New Yorker “A savory memoir of [Reichl’s] apprentice years . . . Reichl describes [her] experiences with infectious humor. . . . The descriptions of each sublime taste are mouthwateringly precise. . . . A perfectly balanced stew of memories.”—Kirkus Reviews

Sunny's Nights

Author: Tim Sultan
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
ISBN: 0812978994
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 290

Book Description
Imagine that Alice had walked into a bar instead of falling down the rabbit hole. In the tradition of J. R. Moehringer’s The Tender Bar and the classic reportage of Joseph Mitchell, here is an indelible portrait of what is quite possibly the greatest bar in the world—and the mercurial, magnificent man behind it. The first time he saw Sunny’s Bar, in 1995, Tim Sultan was lost, thirsty for a drink, and intrigued by the single bar sign among the forlorn warehouses lining the Brooklyn waterfront. Inside, he found a dimly lit room crammed with maritime artifacts, a dozen well-seasoned drinkers, and, strangely, a projector playing a classic Martha Graham dance performance. Sultan knew he had stumbled upon someplace special. What he didn’t know was that he had just found his new home. Soon enough, Sultan has quit his office job to bartend full-time for Sunny Balzano, the bar’s owner. A wild-haired Tony Bennett lookalike with a fondness for quoting Shakespeare and Samuel Beckett, Sunny is truly one of a kind. Born next to the saloon that has been in his family for one hundred years, Sunny has over the years partied with Andy Warhol, spent time in India at the feet of a guru, and painted abstract expressionist originals. But his masterpiece is the bar itself, a place where a sublime mix of artists, mobsters, honky-tonk musicians, neighborhood drunks, nuns, longshoremen, and assorted eccentrics rub elbows. Set against the backdrop of a rapidly transforming city, Sunny’s Nights is a loving and singular portrait of the dream experience we’re all searching for every time we walk into a bar, and an enchanting memoir of an unlikely and abiding friendship. Praise for Sunny’s Nights “Fantastic . . . [Sultan takes] material that might seem familiar and [mixes] a perfect, insightful cocktail: full-bodied, multitextured and delicious. . . . Simply beautiful.”—The New York Times Book Review “Sultan’s love of Red Hook shines through, and it’s hard not to be swept along on the ebb and flow of his emotions. . . . Sultan’s book is, among other things, a meditation on the fragility of the moment and the passage of time. . . . Wistful, funny and biting, Sunny’s Nights rewards you with its evocation of a certain place in time and, as Sultan calls him, ‘the most original man I have ever met.’”—Newsday “An affectionate portrait of the idiosyncratic Sunny’s Bar.”—USA Today “Sultan finds Sunny . . . a real character, a poet, a cinephile, a philosopher, bluegrass maestro and (Rheingold) beer server.”—New York Post (“Required Reading”) “Captivating . . . a classic story about a local bar.”—The Buffalo News “An enchanting memoir, a profound meditation on place and a beautiful story of an unlikely and abiding friendship.”—Brooklyn Daily Eagle “[A] polished, affecting look at remarkable barkeep Sunny Balzano . . . In elegant prose, Sultan deploys laconic humor, an instinct for telling details, a taste for eccentricity, and above all, clear-eyed compassion for our all-too-human failings.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review) “Beautifully wrought . . . an indelible portrait of an unusual man and a nearly forgotten part of NYC.”—Booklist “More than an elegy for a bar and a neighborhood—it’s also a vivid and loving portrait of the larger-than-life eccentric who gave the bar its name and its spirit.”—Tom Perrotta, author of The Leftovers

Reading Group Choices

Author: Reading Group Choices
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780975974476
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 180

Book Description

Gay Bar

Author: Jeremy Atherton Lin
Publisher: Little, Brown
ISBN: 0316458740
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 262

Book Description
NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD WINNER NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY: The New York Times * NPR * Vogue * Gay Times * Artforum * “Gay Bar is an absolute tour de force.” –Maggie Nelson "Atherton Lin has a five-octave, Mariah Carey-esque range for discussing gay sex.” –New York Times Book Review As gay bars continue to close at an alarming rate, a writer looks back to find out what’s being lost in this indispensable, intimate, and stylish celebration of queer history. Strobing lights and dark rooms; throbbing house and drag queens on counters; first kisses, last call: the gay bar has long been a place of solidarity and sexual expression—whatever your scene, whoever you’re seeking. But in urban centers around the world, they are closing, a cultural demolition that has Jeremy Atherton Lin wondering: What was the gay bar? How have they shaped him? And could this spell the end of gay identity as we know it? In Gay Bar, the author embarks upon a transatlantic tour of the hangouts that marked his life, with each club, pub, and dive revealing itself to be a palimpsest of queer history. In prose as exuberant as a hit of poppers and dazzling as a disco ball, he time-travels from Hollywood nights in the 1970s to a warren of cruising tunnels built beneath London in the 1770s; from chichi bars in the aftermath of AIDS to today’s fluid queer spaces; through glory holes, into Crisco-slicked dungeons and down San Francisco alleys. He charts police raids and riots, posing and passing out—and a chance encounter one restless night that would change his life forever. The journey that emerges is a stylish and nuanced inquiry into the connection between place and identity—a tale of liberation, but one that invites us to go beyond the simplified Stonewall mythology and enter lesser-known battlefields in the struggle to carve out a territory. Elegiac, randy, and sparkling with wry wit, Gay Bar is at once a serious critical inquiry, a love story and an epic night out to remember.

Jerry Thomas' Bartenders Guide

Author: Jerry Thomas
Publisher: Ravenio Books
ISBN:
Category : Cooking
Languages : en
Pages : 167

Book Description
This 1862 classic includes the following recipes: Hints and Rules for Bartenders Cocktails Brandy Cocktail Improved Brandy Cocktail Whiskey Cocktail Improved Whiskey Cocktail Gin Cocktail Old Tom Gin Cocktail Improved Gin Cocktail Bottle Cocktail Champagne Cocktail Coffee Cocktail Vermouth Cocktail Fancy Vermouth Cocktail Absinthe Cocktail Japanese Cocktail Manhattan Cocktail Jersey Cocktail Soda Cocktail Saratoga Cocktail Martinez Cocktail Morning Glory Cocktail Crustas Brandy Crusta Whiskey Crusta Gin Crusta Daisies Brandy Daisy Whiskey Daisy Santa Cruz Rum Daisy Gin Daisy Juleps Mint Julep Gin Julep Whiskey Julep Pineapple Julep The Real Georgia Mint Julep Smashes Brandy Smash Gin Smash Whiskey Smash Fixes Brandy Fix Gin Fix Santa Cruz Fix Whiskey Fix Brandy Drinks Brandy Straight Pony Brandy Brandy and Soda Brandy and Ginger Ale Split Soda and Brandy Brandy and Gum Cobblers Sherry Cobbler Champagne Cobbler Catawba Cobbler Hock Cobbler Claret Cobbler Sauterne Cobbler Whiskey Cobbler Saratoga Brace Up Knickerbocker Pousse l’Amour Cafes Santina’s Pousse Cafe Parisian Pousse Cafe Faivre’s Pousse Cafe Saratoga Pousse Cafe Brandy Scaffa Brandy Champerelle West India Couperee White Lion Sours Santa Cruz Sour Gin Sour Whiskey Sour Brandy Sour Jersey Sour Egg Sour Toddies Apple Toddy Cold Brandy Toddy Hot Brandy Toddy Cold Gin Toddy Hot Gin Toddy Cold Whiskey Toddy Cold Irish Whiskey Toddy Egg Noggs Egg Nogg Hot Egg Nogg Egg Nogg for a Party Sherry Egg Nogg General Harrison’s Egg Nogg Baltimore Egg Nogg Fizzes Santa Cruz Fiz Whiskey Fiz Brandy Fiz Gin Fiz Silver Fiz Golden Fiz Slings Brandy Sling Hot Brandy Sling Gin Sling Hot Gin Sling Whiskey Sling Hot Whiskey Sling Rum Drinks Hot Spiced Rum Hot Rum Blue Blazer Tom and Jerry How to Serve Tom and Jerry Copenhagen Skins Scotch Whiskey Skin Irish Whiskey Skin Columbia Skin Tom Collins Whiskey Tom Collins Brandy Tom Collins Gin Flips Hot Brandy Flip Hot Rum Flip Hot Whiskey Flip Hot Gin Flip Cold Brandy Flip Cold Rum Flip Cold Gin Flip Cold Whiskey Flip Port Wine Flip Sherry Wine Flip Mulled Drinks Mulled Wine, with Eggs Mulled Cider Mulled Wine Mulled Wine without Eggs Sangarees Port Wine Sangaree Sherry Sangaree Brandy Sangaree Gin Sangaree Ale Sangaree Porter Sangaree Porteree Negus Port Wine Negus Port Wine Negus Soda Negus Bishops Bishop English Bishop Quince Liqueur Shrubs Currant Shrub Raspberry Shrub Brandy Shrub Rum Shrub Brandy Punch Punches Brandy and Rum Punch Gin Punch Medford Rum Punch Santa Cruz Rum Punch Hot Irish Whiskey Punch Hot Scotch Whiskey Punch Cold Whiskey Punch.* Milk Punch Hot Milk Punch Manhattan Milk Punch Egg Milk Punch El Dorado Punch Claret Punch Sauterne Punch Vanilla Punch Sherry Punch Orgeat Punch Curaçao Punch Roman Punch St. Charles’ Punch Seventh Regiment National Guard Punch Sixty-Ninth Regiment Punch Punch Grassot Maraschino Punch Champagne Punch Mississippi Punch Imperial Brandy Punch Hot Brandy and Rum Punch Rocky Mountain Punch Imperial Punch Thirty-Second Regiment or Victoria Punch Light Guard Punch Philadelphia Fish-House Punch La Patria Punch The Spread Eagle Punch Rochester Punch Non-Such Punch Canadian Punch Tip-Top Brandy Bimbo Punch Cold Ruby Punch Soyer’s Gin Punch Arrack Punch Nuremburg Punch Imperial Arrack Punch * United Service Punch Pineapple Punch Royal Punch Century Club Punch California Milk Punch English Milk Punch Oxford Punch Punch à la Romaine Duke of Norfolk Punch Tea Punch Gothic Punch Punch à la Ford Punch Jelly Dry Punch Regent’s Punch Nectar Punch Orange Punch Wedding Punch West Indian Punch Barbadoes Punch Apple Punch Ale Punch Cider Punch Hot Flips Hot English Rum Flip Hot English Ale Flip Sleeper White Tiger’s Milk Locomotive Sherry Drinks Sherry and Bitters Sherry and Egg Sherry and Ice Shandy Gaff Half and Half “Arf and Arf.” Absinthe and Water French Method of Serving Absinthe Gin and Wormwood Rhine Wine and Seltzer Water White Plush Rock and Rye Stone Fence Boonekamp and Whiskey Jerry Thomas’ Own Decanter Bitters Burnt Brandy and Peach Black Stripe Peach and Honey Gin and Pine Gin and Tansy Temperance Drinks Milk and Seltzer Saratoga Cooler Plain Lemonade Soda Lemonade Egg Lemonade Orgeat Lemonade Fine Lemonade for Parties Soda Nectar Nectar for Dog Days Soda Cocktail English Fancy Drinks Claret Cup, à la Brunow Champagne Cup, à la Brunow Balaklava Nectar Crimean Cup, à la Marmora Crimean Cup, à la Wyndham Rumfustian Claret Cup Porter Cup Claret Cup, à la Lord Saltoun Mulled Claret, à la Lord Saltoun Italian Lemonade Bishop à la Prusse Bottled Velvet English Curaçao Syrups, Essences, Tinctures, Colorings, etc Plain Syrup Gum Syrup Lemon Syrup Essence of Lemon Essence of Cognac Solferino Coloring Caramel Tincture of Orange Peel Tincture of Lemon Peel Tincture of Cloves Tincture of Cinnamon Tincture of Allspice Tincture of Gentian Capillaire Capillaire Ratafia Aromatic Tincture Prepared Punch and Punch Essences Essence of Roman Punch for Bottling Essence of Kirschwasser Punch for Bottling Essence of Brandy Punch for Bottling Essence of Bourbon Whiskey Punch Essence of Rum Punch Essence of St. Domingo Punch for Bottling Essence of Punch D’Orsay for Bottling Empire City Punch for Bottling Imperial Raspberry Whiskey Punch for Bottling Duke of Norfolk Punch for Bottling Essence of Rum Punch for Bottling Essence of Arrack Punch for Bottling Essence of Wine Punch for Bottling Essence of Claret Wine Punch for Bottling Essence of Regent Punch for Bottling Prepared Cocktails for Bottling Brandy Cocktail for Bottling Brandy Cocktail for Bottling Gin Cocktail for Bottling Bourbon Cocktail for Bottling

Two and Two

Author: Rafe Bartholomew
Publisher: Little, Brown
ISBN: 0316231606
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 255

Book Description
A deeply stirring memoir of fathers, sons, and the oldest bar in New York City. Since it opened in 1854, McSorley's Old Ale House has been a New York institution. This is the landmark watering hole where Abraham Lincoln campaigned and Boss Tweed kicked back with the Tammany Hall machine. Where a pair of Houdini's handcuffs found their final resting place. And where soldiers left behind wishbones before departing for the First World War, never to return and collect them. Many of the bar's traditions remain intact, from the newspaper-covered walls to the plates of cheese and raw onions, the sawdust-strewn floors to the tall-tales told by its bartenders. But in addition to the bar's rich history, McSorley's is home to a deeply personal story about two men: Rafe Bartholomew, the writer who grew up in the landmark pub, and his father, Geoffrey "Bart" Bartholomew, a career bartender who has been working the taps for forty-five years. On weekends, Rafe Bartholomew would tag along for the early hours of his dad's shift, polishing brass doorknobs, watching over the bar cats, and handling other odd jobs until he grew old enough to join Bart behind the bar. McSorley's was a place of bizarre rituals, bawdy humor, and tasks as unique as the bar itself: protecting the decades-old dust that had gathered on treasured artifacts; shot-putting thirty-pound grease traps into high-walled Dumpsters; and trying to keep McSorley's open through the worst of Hurricane Sandy. But for Rafe, the bar means home. It's the place where he and his father have worked side by side, serving light and dark ale, always in pairs, the way it's always been done. Where they've celebrated victories, like the publication of his father's first book of poetry, and coped with misfortune, like the death of Rafe's mother. Where Rafe learned to be part of something bigger than himself and also how to be his own man. By turns touching, crude, and wildly funny, Rafe's story reveals universal truths about family, loss, and the bursting history of one of New York's most beloved institutions.

The Magic of Memoir

Author: Linda Joy Myers
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1631521489
Category : Reference
Languages : en
Pages : 344

Book Description
The Magic of Memoir is a memoirist’s companion for when the going gets tough. Editors Linda Joy Myers and Brooke Warner have taught and coached hundreds of memoirists to the completion of their memoirs, and they know that the journey is fraught with belittling messages from both the inner critic and naysayers, voices that make it hard to stay on course with the writing and completion of a book. In The Magic of Memoir, 38 writers share their hard-won wisdom, stories, and writing tips. Included are Myers's and Warner's interviews with best-selling and widely renown memoirists Mary Karr, Elizabeth Gilbert, Dr. Azar Nafisi, Dani Shapiro, Margo Jefferson, Raquel Cepeda, Jessica Valenti, Daisy Hernández, Mark Matousek, and Sue William Silverman. This collection has something for anyone who's on the journey or about to embark on it. If you're looking for inspiration, The Magic of Memoir will be a valuable companion. Contributors include: Jill Kandel, Eanlai Cronin, Peter Gibb, Lynette Charity, Lynette Charity, Roseann M. Bozzone, Carol E. Anderson, Bella Mahaya Carter, Krishan Bedi, Sarah Conover, Leza Lowitz, Nadine Kenney Johnstone, Lynette Benton, Kelly Kittel, Robert W. Finertie, Rita M. Gardner, Robert Hammond, Marina Aris, LaDonna Harrison, Jill Smolowe, Alison Dale, Vanya Erickson, Sonvy Sammons, Laurie Prim, Ashley Espinoza, Jing Li, Nancy Chadwick-Burke, Dhana Musil, Crystal-Lee Quibell, Apryl Schwab, Irene Sardanis, Jude Walsh, Fran Simone, Rosalyn Kaplus, Rosie Sorenson, Rosie Sorenson, Jerry Waxler, and Ruthie Stender.