Lit & Liquor

This week, Lit & Liquor made the decision to dive back into a self-published anthology, though if your hopes are getting up, we'll crush them now and say that unfortunately, there is no pirate/Irish/Scottish accent blend in this episode. We hope you'll forgive us for this oversight.

Instead, we chose an anthology with an interesting concept: the theme was dystopian, but every single story had to end with the same phrase: "From now on, I'll save myself." Thus the name, "From Now On--a Last Words Anthology".

In an apparent attempt to bring about our own end of days, we each decided to bring a shot to the table for the book. We had a Lemon Drop shot, an M&M shot, and a Loopy shot, which uses Rum Chata and Loopy Vodka, which is Fruit Loop flavored for any uncultured sober kids out there. Since Ashley and Sam couldn't find any Loopy Vodka, they took an uncharted adventure into the world of infusing vodka...with Fruit Loops. Listen to see our experiment ended up!

We've allowed ourselves to be vulnerable this week, guys. Our geekiness, while never hidden away completely on this show, came out to play in full force with this long awaited (by us, anyway) anime episode. It was Kassandra's first time dipping a toe into these beautiful animated waters, but trust you us--she's since dove straight into the deep end with nary a breath of air.

First up is "Ouran High School Host Club," paired with a popular TikTok fad of five minutes ago, Whipped Coffee, ours being spiked, of course. Needing a little testosterone after all those rose animations, we follow with popular "One Punch Man," and what could be better paired with this than a Rum Punch Man cocktail?

Pitting romance novels against each other just didn't prove to be enough of a battle for our bloodthirsty selves, so we came up with a different mix to throw into the ring: father versus son in the combination of Stephen King and his son, Joe King or as the literary world knows him, Joe Hill. You may remember him from an earlier episode as the author of a horror anthology, "21st Century Ghosts", which had mixed reviews from the group.

This week, we decided to take each of their first full-length novels and see how they compared. For the "King of Horror" that ended up being "Carrie", so naturally we had to settle down with our blood orange cocktail, "The Favorite," and watch the movie as well.

Joe Hill's first novel went by the name "Heart Shaped Box", and in what was deemed to be a purposeful break from his father's favorite book setting of Maine, our characters traveled up and down and around and across the South of the good old USA, blood and destruction following. Therefore, our Southern Spiked Peach Iced Tea helped to wash away the gore just a little bit. Listen on to find out who our favorite was!

You hear that noise? Quiet, quiet... ah, yes, that one. The sound of a Viking warlord soundly spanking his captive. Not your cup of tea? Well, ours neither but you can look forward to such things in this weeks romance novel face off episode! Last rounds winner, the samurai, is represented by "Firefly: Warrior Woman of the Samurai". While they again didn't show too strongly in the ring, at least our Lychee Sour cocktail brought its best self.

In the other corner, switch in hand and ready to strike, is "Conquered by the Viking" by Ashe Barker. What other choice for a drink pairing was there than mead? We explored a Honey Wine and a flavored Passionfruit Mead to soften blows of all types from this book.

There's nothing we like better than real history packaged as fiction with a little--or a lot--of dramatic flair. There's nothing we mutually dislike more than Nazis, and our books this week delivered some of both.

Ashley has a personal connection with our first book, "Citizen 865" by Debbie Cenzipek, which is a completely factual exploration into the famed Nazi hunters within the US government. Though a completely sobering tale, our Häagen Dazs Spirits Ice Cream kept our spirits up through this discussion (pun intended).

Adding a little more amusement but no less horror to the discussion was "The Boys From Brazil" by Ira Levin, a story that uses real figures from WWII for a fictitious plot about raising clones of Hitler for the Fourth Reich. Aside from historical facts, you can also find out the truth of whether sword canes are lawfully allowed in the US, and enjoy all it all over our White Sand Cocktail, using our new and much beloved Leblon Cachaça rum.

Don't forget, new episodes weekly during June and July! See you next week, lieblings!

If you, too, have felt serial killer urges at any point while dealing with people in a grocery store... well, officially we have to tell you: you should seek counseling. Unofficially, you should know you're not alone and might find this episode where we read two serial killer books a little validating.

"Darkly Dreaming Dexter" by Jeff Lindsay may have a ring of familiarity to it, as it serves as the basis for the Showtime show "Dexter". Trying to switch things up this week, the crew chose beers and reaffirmed, though it wasn't really in question, that we are just not really beer people. We tried, y'all. This book was paired with two brews from Rogue Brewing Company, the aptly named Dead Guy Ale and a Chocolate Nitro Stout.

Rounding out our episode with a little grocery store rage, torture, and some other kinks and fetishes we just can't mention here, is "Cold Cole Heart" by K. Webster. You'll find our Flying Dog: Raging Bitch beer pairs perfectly with a few of the characters mentioned therein.

Happy to see us, or is that just a book in your pocket? For the time being, Lit & Liquor is back to weekly episodes through the summer! Hey, we gotta make this quarantine drinking feel like it's accomplishing something!

Behold a momentous day in L&L history: we knew when a fruit was in season...and we actually managed to get it and use it in our drink. Dragonfruit, this time, we win.

Anyways.

This week we're back into (and I quote), "some weird ass alien shit" with "Dawn" by Octavia Butler. Over an In Case of Alien Invasion cocktail, we discuss some interesting morality questions, survival of the fittest, and as was already hinted, just some really weird alien sex things.

Moving on to bloodier and more intense but definitely more interesting things, our second book was a debut novel, "Rage of Dragons" by Evan Winter. This book earned a rare average rating of four shots and was enjoyed by everyone around the table. Our discussion lasted so long, you'll probably want to make the Dragonfruit Mimosa a double or triple.

You really thought we'd let quarantine pass us by without discussing how it's just an excuse for us all to drink? Join us for all kinds of Corona madness--the beer, the seltzer, the refresca, the mixed drink, and of course the virus--in a special liquor-only episode.

As is so often the case for Lit & Liquor, this week we drunkenly stumbled into a new and popular genre: Brazilian crime novels. Who knew?

From a list of the top thrillers in this category, we chose "Blood of the Wicked" by Leighton Gage, and spoiler alerts: there was a lot of blood, and there was a lot of wickedness. Join us in the thrilling world of Brazil, corrupt cops, street gangs and, of course, excellent rum.

It must be said, as hinted in our title, that we owe the rum world an apology. For one, we finally learned how to pronounce the word 'cachaça' and our initial efforts were, well... Let's just move on from that dark time. Secondly, given Ashley and Kassandra's love of the drink called a caipirinha and the knowledge it contains the (previously thought to be) ghastly cachaça rum, they went on a quest to find the best cachaça rum for a caipirinha and see if it lived up to their memory.

We're very happy to report that Leblon Cachaça is worlds different from the motor oil packaged as alcohol from our Bamboo Bullshit episode, and the difference has to be tasted to be believed. Cachaça is also one of Brazil's most popular spirits, leading to a most excellent companion for this book.

Our first full book and liquor episode for season three dives right into current culture, since we never met a Netflix show we couldn't binge watch by justifying it's 'for the podcast, all for the podcast!' Not to mention, with a shirtless Henry Cavill for Ashley and Kassandra, and some great fantasy for Sam, there was happiness all around the drinking table this week.

Our book was "The Last Wish" by Andrzej Sapkowski, a collection of short stories from which the Netflix tv show "The Witcher" is based. While the concepts and world in the book made for interesting reading, the show won as our favorite by a wide margin. And not at all because of the beautiful and often nude members of both sexes there within... Lit & Liquor is nothing but class, folks. And while our Cat Potion cocktail does not, in fact, offer any illumination into the confusing timeline of the show, it's still damn delicious.