The Callahan Touch

Opening night at Mary’s Place draws the refugees from the now-defunct Callahan’s Bar; and bartender Jake Stonebender quickly learns that Mary’s Place attracts as many bizarre events and persons – including a drunken leprechaun – as its beloved predecessor. The story, says Booklist, “hangs together on the strength of Jake's appealing voice and the bar scene, which is hip and witty.”

Written by Hugo and Nebula-Award winning author Spider Robinson.

From Library Journal

When a creature that resembles a drunken leprechaun drops in unexpectedly at Mary's Place, bartender Jake Stonebender gets his first inkling that his establishment might just live up to his expectations as a special bar where unusual things happen. Like Robinson's other Callahan stories, this tale unfolds at a leisurely pace that contrasts delightfully with the strangeness of the events chronicled. A good choice for sf collections and for series fans.

Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Does this popular series (Lady Slings the Booze ) start to run thin? Yes, if you're expecting any sort of plot line; no, if you delight in its playfulness and intellect. Jake Stonebender is back--earnest, wisecracking, and elliptical--to tell us of the opening of a new bar called Mary's (rather than Callahan's) Place and to call forth the memories the series has created. A stranger named Jonathan materializes and announces that he is responsible for introducing AIDS to the human race. An intriguing debate about the origin of AIDS and moral responsibility in general follows but then drifts away--as bar conversations tend to do; other characters--such as "the Duck," "Fast Eddie" the musician, and those weird newlyweds Isham and Tanya--take stage. The story is a rambler, in other words, but more or less hangs together on the strength of Jake's appealing voice and the bar scene, which is hip and witty. It's coffeehouse science fiction, one might say. An acquired taste, but a good number of readers have acquired it, and Robinson has won many awards. John Mort