Friday Black, from Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, is a fiercely satiric collection where racism and unbridled capitalism are firmly under the author’s sway, but there are moments of tender magic here, too. Not much drinking happens in these chimerical tales, but one of the stories has a character craving “Good” that make his head feel “the way an orange tastes,” so I started there and ended on the final story, “Through the Flash,” for the drink’s name.
The Flash
1 oz. Genever
1 oz. Orange Juice
.5 oz Triple Sec
2 dashes Orange Bitters
Charred orange slice for garnish
Shake all (except orange slice) with ice. Strain into a chilled coupe glass.
Garnish with orange.
Gone So Long, from Andre Dubus III, brutally depicts the effects of a crime on a daughter separated from her father. His horrific act instills the seeds of hate in the grandmother left to raise the three-year-old. Dubus delves deeply into his characters and asks questions about atonement, guilt, vulnerability and strength. Halfway through the story, the daughter, now grown, wonders if she’s embarked on a fateful odyssey, so this is for her.
Odyssey
1.5 oz. tequilla
.25 oz. triple sec
.25 oz. simple syrup
Splash of blue Curaçao
Citrus peel for garnish
Stir all with ice. Twist peel over drink and then use to garnish.
Rebecca Serle’s novel,
The Dinner List - both touching and eloquent - delivers a powerful cry as summer ends. Imagine bringing five people, living or dead, together for one dinner - which is what Serle has done here to marvelous effect. Only fitting, I thought, that her gathering should end with a Roman Holiday. Read the book to discover why.
ROMAN HOLIDAY
2 cups Peach Ice Cream or Sorbet
.5 cups Prosecco
.25 oz. Chianti
Rosemary leaves and peach slices for garnish
Combine ice cream and Prosecco.
Pipe into chilled glasses. Drizzle with the wine. Garnish.
Megan Abbott is back with a fascinating study of a teen friendship that breaks under the strain of revealed secrets, then delves back into that wickedly twisted relationship later when the ex-friends are pitted against each other. Usually I’m looking for the elements of my cocktails between the covers of a book - for the first time, I took my inspiration from the cover. I’m combing floral scents with rich smokiness, leading to a slow burn that’s actually very smooth.
Slow Burn
2 oz. Ardbeg 10 Year Old Scotch
1 oz. rose liqueur
1 oz. simple syrup
.75 oz. lemon juice
Rose petals for garnish Combine all and shake with ice. Strain into a chilled glass and pour over ice. Garnish with rose petals - lit or unlit.
In The Great Believers, Rebecca Makkai gives us a devastating account of Chicago in 1985 as the city feels an epidemic’s effects - “slow-motion tsunamis from both coasts” closing in. As the story jumps back and forth 30 years, Makkai reminds us that art and love are often most appreciated when juxtaposed with longing, with loss. This cherry martini is named in The Great Believers - but not its ingredients, so this is what I believe was served up.
Door County Special
2.5 oz. Plymouth Gin
.5 oz Maraschino Liqueur
2 dashes cherry bitters
Cherry for garnish
Stir all with ice. Strain into chilled glass. Garnish with cherry.
Tommy Orange’s There There begins with a blistering prologue & doesn’t let up. In its pages, 12 individuals show life from the perspective of urban Native Americans in Orange’s Oakland, CA, hometown. Some of his characters eschew alcohol for powerful reasons, so for them I’m offering a summer quencher served in a glass from a long-shuttered Oakland watering hole.
Red Feather’s Lemonade
1.5 cups zesty simple syrup*
1 cup lemon juice
3 cups sparkling water
12 large strawberries
Lemon peel for garnish
Purée strawberries. Add to simple syrup & lemon juice. Stir well. Add sparkling water.
Garnish individual glasses with peel.
*Zesty Simple Syrup
1 cup sugar
1 cup water
Zest from 1 lemon
Mix all over low heat until sugar has dissolved. Let sit 1 hour. Strain out lemon zest. Keeps for 5 days, refrigerated.
Rachel Kushner’s devastating novel, The Mars Room, introduces the reader to Romy Hall as she leaves jail to enter a lifetime of incarceration in a California Correctional Facility. But then her voice is joined by a chorus of others and their stories become deeper, darker. The drink here needed to be simple, with the Lancers making up its body but serving as an echo of past trauma.
Mars Room Spritz
1 bottle Lancers Rosé
1 cup Honey Simple Syrup
1 cup Sliced Strawberries
1 Sliced Lemon
Seltzer
Muddle a few strawberries and half the lemon. Mix the Lancers, syrup, and remaining fruit in a pitcher. Chill in refrigerator. Add ice. Pour into ice-filled glasses and top with Seltzer.
After the stunning success of The Imperfectionists, Tom Rachman returns with an equally exquisite novel, The Italian Teacher. There’s plenty of drinking in these pages, so I had many directions open, but decided on starting with calvados since it’s crucial to an important scene near the novel’s end. I’m jealous that you get to read this work for the first time.
Is Silence Safer
1.5 oz. Calvados
.5 oz. Coarse Red Wine
.75 oz. Lemon Juice
.75 oz. Simple Syrup
Apple Slices for Garnish
Shake all with ice. Strain into chilled glass. Garnish with apple.
Uzodinma Iweala’s Speak No Evil, though slim, carries enormous emotional weight. Told in two parts - by best friends, Niru and Meredith, graduating seniors with their lives stretching before them - the novel begins innocently as they share hot chocolate spiked by Meredith. Neither foresees the consequences of the cold night. Mix yourself a warm cup and prepare to finish this gorgeous & raw novel in one sitting.
6 oz Hot Chocolate*
2 oz. Johnnie Walker Black Label Scotch
Mint-infused whipped cream*
Mint sprig for garnish
Combine hot chocolate and scotch in a warmed vessel.
Add whipped cream and garnish with mint.
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Forugh Farrokzhad is the best poet you’ve never heard of.
Her story is beautifully told by Jasmin Darznik in Song of a Captive Bird.
Food and drink were an important part of Farrokzad’s (difficult) upbringing in Iran,
so I wanted to meld the two in tribute to her short, brilliant life.
Last Lullaby
1 oz. arak
.5 oz lemon juice
.5 oz. water
1 sugar cube
3-5 basil leaves
2 pear slices
Sour cherries for garnish
Muddle sugar, basil & pear with the water.
Strain. Add remaining ingredients and shake with ice.
Strain into chilled glass and garnish with cherries.
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