Stephanie Danler

*A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER | A USA TODAY BESTSELLER | AN INDIE BESTSELLER* A lush, thrilling debut about a year in the life of a uniquely beguiling young woman, set in the wild, alluring world of a famous downtown New York restaurant. "Let's say I was born when I came over the George Washington Bridge..." This is how we meet unforgettable Tess, the 22-year-old at the heart of this stunning debut. Shot like a bullet from a mundane past, she's come to New York to escape the provincial, to take on her destiny. After she stumbles into a coveted job at a renowned Union Square restaurant, we spend the year with her as she learns the chaotic, punishing, privileged life of a "backwaiter," on and off duty. Her appetites are awakened, for food, wine, knowledge and experience; and she's pulled into the thrall of two other servers--a handsome bartender she falls hard for, and an older woman whose connection to both young lovers is murky, sensual, and overpowering. These two will prove to be Tess's hardest lesson of all. Sweetbitter is a story about discovery, enchantment, and the power of what remains after disillusionment.

A remarkable literary debut: a young womans coming-of-age story, set against the glitzy, grimy backdrop of New Yorks most elite restaurants.Newly arrived in New York City, twenty-two-year-old Tess lands a job as a backwaiter at a celebrated downtown Manhattan restaurant. What follows is the story of her education: in champagne and cocaine, love and lust, dive bars and fine dining rooms, as she learns to navigate the chaotic, enchanting, punishing life she has chosen. As her appetites awakenfor food and wine, but also for knowledge, experience, and belongingTess finds herself helplessly drawn into a darkly alluring love triangle. In Sweetbitter, Stephanie Danler deftly conjures with heart-stopping accuracy the nonstop and high-adrenaline world of the restaurant industry and evokes the infinite possibilities, the unbearable beauty, and the fragility and brutality of being young in New York.

Tess, una veinteañera inexperta, llega a Nueva York desde su pequeña ciudad provinciana en el verano de 2006. No tiene amigos y apenas dinero. Sólo cuenta con una habitación alquilada en Brooklyn y una curiosidad infinita. Cuando consigue un trabajo como camarera suplente en un conocido restaurante de Manhattan todo un mundo se abre ante ella. Su relato abarcara ese primer año de descubrimientos: ostras, champagne, borgoña, cocaina, amistad, lujuria, amor y bares de mala muerte. Tess se deja arrastrar por Simone, una camarera experimentada que se convertira en mentora, y se enamorara de Jake, un camarero atractivo y misterioso que tambien mantiene una relacion inquebrantable con Simone. Cuando esa relacion se convierta en triangulo, Tess aprendera la leccion mas importante de su vida.Stephanie Danler vive en Brooklyn. Tiene un master en escritura creativa por la New School, que logro despues de trabajar como camarera en Manhattan durante siete años. "Dulceagrio" es su primera novela y el resultado de ambas experiencias.

You will develop a palate. A palate is a spot on your tongue where you remember. Where you assign words to the textures of taste. Eating becomes a discipline, language-obsessed. You will never simply eat food again. These are the words that introduce us to Tess, the twenty-two-year-old narrator of Sweetbitterand you will never again read a debut coming-of-age novel as stunning as this one. Shot from a mundane, provincial past, Tess comes to New York in the stifling summer of 2006. Alone, knowing no one, living in a rented room in Williamsburg, she manages to land a job as a backwaiter at a celebrated downtown Manhattan restaurant. This begins the year we spend with Tess as she starts to navigate the chaotic, enchanting, punishing, and privileged life she has chosen, as well as the remorseless and luminous city around her. What follows is her education: in oysters, Champagne, the appellations of Burgundy, friendship, cocaine, lust, love, and dive bars. As her appetites awakenfor food and wine, but also for knowledge, experience, and belongingwe see her helplessly drawn into a darkly alluring love triangle. With an orphans ardor she latches onto Simone, a senior server at the restaurant who has lived in ways Tess only dreams of, and against the warnings of coworkers she falls under the spell of Jake, the elusive, tatted up, achingly beautiful bartender. These two and their enigmatic connection to each other will prove to be Tesss most exhilarating and painful lesson of all. Stephanie Danler intimately defines the crucial transition from girl to woman, from living in a place that feels like nowhere to living in a place that feels like the center of the universe. She deftly conjures the nonstop and purely adrenalized world of the restaurantconversations interrupted, phrases overheard, relationships only partially revealed. And she evokes the infinite possibilities, the unbearable beauty, the fragility and brutality of being young in New York with heart-stopping accuracy. A lush novel of the sensesof taste and hunger, seeing and understanding, love and desireSweetbitter is ultimately about the power of what remains after disillusionment, and the transformation and wisdom that come from our experiences, sweet and bitter. From the Hardcover edition

From the author of the international bestseller Sweetbitter, a memoir of survival, starting over, and love in all its complicated guises. Even after achieving her dream of selling her debut novel, Stephanie Danler feels adrift in New York. Struggling in the throes of a doomed relationship and haunted by her tumultuous childhood, something nameless compels her to return home to Southern California. In a cottage in Laurel Canyon, as a new life begins to shape itself, she finally succumbs to memories of the past that have proved impossible to escape. A father who swung in and out of her life erratically, charming and mercurial and prone to addiction. A mother now disabled by years of alcoholism and an aneurysm, who cannot remember the abuse she inflicted. The looming, desolate mountains of Colorado, and a teenage freedom that nearly killed her. And above all, the painful love and forgiveness for those who failed her over and over again. Its such a thrill to watch a writer open up her greediest thoughts, to slice open little pockets of her skin and root around underneath her flesh. New York Times Book Review A compulsive, neck-breaking masterpiece. Lisa Taddeo This is a story of triumph: the triumph of grit, talent, grace, and beauty over the dark pull of inner demons. Dani Shapiro

A fantastic read think Girls meets Kitchen Confidential Stylist An adrenalised love song Mail on SundayA stunning debut novel Jay McInerney, author of Bright Lights, Big City*AN OBSERVER BOOK OF THE YEAR 2016 | A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER | A USA TODAY BESTSELLER | AN INDIE BESTSELLER* Tess is the 22-year-old narrator of this stunning first novel. Moving to New York, a place at the centre of the universe, from a place that feels like nowhere to live, she lands a job at a renowned Union Square restaurant and begins to navigate the chaotic and punishing life of a waiter, on and off duty. As her appetites awaken not just for food and wine but also for knowledge and friendship Tess becomes helplessly drawn into a dark, alluring love triangle.Sweetbitter is a novel of the senses. Of taste and hunger, of love and desire, and the wisdom that comes from our experiences, both sweet and bitter.

From the bestselling author of Sweetbitter, a memoir of growing up in a family shattered by lies and addiction, and of one womans attempts to find a life beyond the limits of her past. Stray is a moving, sometimes devastating, brilliantly written and ultimately inspiring exploration of the landscapes of damage and survival.After selling her first novel--a dream shed worked long and hard for--Stephanie Danler knew she should be happy. Instead, she found herself driven to face the difficult past shed left behind a decade ago: a mother disabled by years of alcoholism, further handicapped by a tragic brain aneurysm; a father who abandoned the family when she was three, now a meth addict in and out of recovery. After years in New York City shes pulled home to Southern California by forces she doesnt totally understand, haunted by questions of legacy and trauma. Here, she works toward answers, uncovering hard truths about her parents and herself as she explores whether its possible to change the course of her history. Lucid and honest, heart-breaking and full of hope, Stray is an examination of what we inherit and what we dont have to, of what we have to face in ourselves to move forward, and what its like to let go of ones parents in order to find peace--and a family--of ones own.

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From the internationally bestselling author of Sweetbitter, a provocative and heady mix of true crime and dark pyschological noir, set during the Menendez trial in 1990s LALos Angeles, early 90s. Rodney King has been beaten, East LA has burned, the Northridge earthquake has collapsed the 10 freeway, and two handsome brothers from Beverly Hills are on trial for the brutal murder of their parents. The entire country is riveted.So is Hugo Byrne.A renowned journalist decades sober, privately repressed, and haunted by the violent death of his own daughter Hugo arrives at the Chateau Marmont to cover the trial for a glossy national magazine. He intends to write the definitive account of the Menendez trial. Instead, he finds himself less interested in the evidence, and pulled into something murkier, lurid, and tragic.What happens outside the courtroom is just as fascinating as the theatrE inside. And no one fascinates Hugo more than his close friend Liv Ellis, a quick-witted, bookish Beverly Hills society wife who accompanies Hugo to the trial and whose obsession with the trial is as mysterious as her origins.What happened in the Menendez house? Who is Liv Ellis? And what happens in the homes of the glitterati that haunt the citys seen and be seen restaurants, hotel lounges and tennis clubs?A heady mix of true crime and dark psychological noir, Smog is a story of wealth, privilege, and abuse a suspenseful inquiry into the dark heart of that universal institution that is supposed to protect us but so often betrays: the family.