Sweetbitter was my picnic and poolside novel for the long Memorial Day weekend.
Long ago, I read The New York Times review and heard the author interviewed on NPR. More recently, I realized a television series for the book is available. So, to finally get with the times, I hastily reserved a copy.
I should mention I've read two pieces of restaurant literature before.
A few weeks before Parker was born, I read the 1933 memoir Down and Out in Paris and London, which is about being a fine waiter. Almost a decade later, I read Anthony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential, which is about being a fine chef. Now, between bonfires and Georgia Peach Coca-Colas, I read Stephanie Danler's Sweetbitter, which is about more than both books, at least on several fronts.
Sweetbitter is about food and it's about fine dining and it's about New York City. It's about relationships (some toxic) and the choreographed ballet of restaurant service. It's also about oysters and late night partying.
It's about the changing of the seasons and insects in restaurants. And it's about power dynamics between people, too.
There's also a splash of privilege taking a tour of the proletariat. A reader gets the sense the twenty-something narrator is toiling hard with the luxury of a private safety net beneath her, something unavailable to the author's other characters.
And then, of course, there's also the wine. I do not drink and never will, but Sweetbitter splashes in a luxurious (and expensive) sensory world. This world is firmly closed to me. My private beliefs hold this door shut, and for it, I hold mostly gratitude. Yet it is delightful to know there are complex pleasures out there that bring others joy, and they require no commitment from me.
Also, there's a narrative and prose that morphs swiftly into culinary poetry and free verse of service and labor. I love that. Like, I love that a lot.
And there's also broken English by the Russian employee Sasha, and his comments to the narrator on accepting the consequences of enthusiastic choices made me smile.
So, yes, I enjoyed the novel in the Memorial Day sunshine, and yes, you might want to read it, too, at least, if your Memorial Day isn't over yet.
After all, while there's so much out there to read, it's always nice to find something finer, especially if it's about food. #PublicLibrariesRock