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which stand to be colonized). Things get sticky in the retelling: Heart of Darkness is as open to celebration as it is to question, with readers and critics wondering if it’s a novel about prejudice . . . or just a prejudiced novel. (The natives don’t even get dialogue!) Such themes are above our pay grade, so we’ll just stick to asking the questions, leaving the room, and coming back with a drink as dark and misty as the awkward silence hanging around us.
    1½ ounces blackberry liqueur
    Â½ ounce gin
    Â½ ounce lemon juice
    As quickly as possible—the guests need you in the living room, and for the love of God when did the music stop playing?— shake all ingredients with ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

THE MOONSHINE AND SIXPENCE
THE MOON AND SIXPENCE (1919)
BY W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM
    H ell hath no midlife crisis like a stockbroker who wakes up one day, looks at his wife and kids at breakfast, and announces he’s taking a one-way trip to Paris to pursue life as a painter. Now could somebody please pass Daddy the pancakes ? Along the way, Maugham’s artist—a stand-in for famed real-life painter Paul Gauguin—makes the perfectly logical geographical progression from Paris to Marseilles to Tahiti, where he finally finds contentment and his own kind of success (never mind his leprosy in the end). Sip on this “moonshine” cooler next time you need inspiration to break out of that cubicle and head to the tropics—even if only in your dreams.
    1½ ounces cheap whiskey
    Splash of pineapple juice
    Squeeze of coconut cream (like Coco Reál Cream of Coconut)
    Pour the ingredients over ice in a rocks glass (or travel mug!). Give a good stir, grab your Tahitian for Dummies guide, and head for the airport; you’re goin’ places.



A FAREWELL TO AMARETTO
A FAREWELL TO ARMS (1929)
BY ERNEST HEMINGWAY
    W idely lauded as Hemingway’s most accomplished work, A Farewell to Arms firmly established his spare, just-the-facts prose. Little wonder: before doing time as an ambulance driver in World War I, Hemingway was a junior reporter in Kansas City. Much of Farewell draws directly from Hemingway’s own life abroad, from mortar shell injuries to angelic nurses. Nobody said war was easy, but just when you think the narrative is gonna land nice and quiet in Switzerland, Hemingway throws a friggin’ dead baby into the mix. We salute Hemingway’s complicated time in the Italian campaign with that country’s own amaretto. Take this one like a soldier: sour but fighting.
    2 ounces amaretto
    Â½ ounce lemon juice
    1 teaspoon granulated sugar
    Combine the amaretto, lemon juice, and sugar in a shaker with ice. Shake well and strain over fresh ice in a rocks glass. Best enjoyed after returning home from a stint overseas, with bonus points awarded if you can get your girlfriend—or boyfriend!—into a nurse’s uniform.

ONE HUNDRED BEERS OF SOLITUDE
ONE HUNDRED YEARS OF SOLITUDE (1967)
BY GABRIEL GARCÍA MÁRQUEZ
    T he most celebrated work by Latin America’s prince of prose, One Hundred Years of Solitude traces one family’s multigenerational triumphs and devastations in establishing a South American settlement. Pressing hard on the symbolism pedal, Márquez uses the colors yellow and gold like a weaver, threading death and wealth throughout a story of inevitable decline. We borrow his palette, pairing South America’s most famous beer—Cusqueña, the “gold of Incas”—with a cheery, yellow lemonade. The result is so lightweight, you can water your solitude down with a hundred of these—give or take your dignity.
    3 ounces carbonated lemonade (like Martinelli’s Sparkling Classic Lemonade)
    8 ounces light beer (like Cusqueña)
    2 dashes Angostura bitters
    Pour the lemonade into a chilled pint glass. Fill to the top with beer and add a dash or two of bitters. Now, sit back and prepare for life’s