The Tender Bar

"Simply a wonderful book about a heaven of a life that had everything going against it except intense love."

"Moehringer has crafted a yearning, lyrical account of his fatherless youth and the companionship he found...among the Dickensian characters at a neighborhood bar."

"The Tender Bar will make you thirsty for that life--its camaraderie, its hilarity, its seductive, dangerous wisdom."

"The best memoirist of his kind since Mary Karr wrote The Liars' Club."

"In his gimlet-eyed memoir, The Tender Bar, J.R. Moehringer lovingly and affectingly toasts a boyhood spent on a barstool."

"The best thing about The Tender Bar is that it is many stories in one."

"A memoir about coming of age in, of all places, a great American bar. Blessedly, Moehringer's story is both joyous and triumphant."

"A beautiful, gravelly love letter."

"[Moehringer] deftly acknowledges his background's writerly connections, describing his journey--from fatherless urchin living in his grandfather's messy house to hard-drinking New York Times copyboy--with Dickensian grandeur and displaying good humor about his failures."

"Supremely great."

"J. R. Moehringer has found a new perfect."

"It's a fierce and funny coming-of-age story about ambition and yearning and necessary betrayals . . . superb literary brew."

"An engaging delight."

"Intoxicating and sobering. Emotionally engrossing, beautifully written."

"A wistful study of the character--and characters--of a Long Island bar...in the tradition of Joseph Mitchell and Damon Runyon."

"A moving and evocative memoir. Moehringer imbues the place and the singular men who frequented it with loving humanity."

"Heart-wrenchingly funny."

"The only thing wrong with this terrific debut is that there has to be a closing time."

"Moehringer's book is a homage to the culture of the local pub....Moehringer's lovely evocation of an ordinary place filled with ordinary people gives dignity and meaning to those lost lives, and to his own."

"It's a rare writer who recollects his trials with clarity and dispassion, giving us not voyeurism but a good look at ourselves....[Moehringer] recalls events as disparate as losing his virginity and getting his first newspaper job (at the New York Times) with a newsman's imperative to get the story....Funny, honest, and insightful, The Tender Bar finds universal themes in an unusual upbringing and declares a real love of barroom life without romanticizing it too much."

"First-rate storytelling."

"J.R. Moehringer's fascinating memoir opens with the premise that men are either good or bad--and his father is not measuring up too well."

"Every so often a memoir comes along that is so rich, captivating, and insightful that it feels more like an epic tale than a mere account of somebody's life. The Tender Bar belongs in that category."

"What a stunning memoir it is--heartfelt, overflowing with longing, topped off with joy, despair, and, above all, compassion for the human condition. Moehringer creates a world that is as real as it is hilarious and tragic."

"Powerful storytelling at its true story best. It's a life-changing work about a changed life, a gentle giant not to be missed."

"Hugely entertaining and endearing. A loving and clear-eyed portrait of the sort of community that can be as ruinous as it is sustaining. The considerable achievement of The Tender Bar is in the beautifully recreated voices, tall tales and dashed dreams of all the wonderful characters who, unlike the author, never quite managed to make it out of Manhasset--or even bothered to try."

"Tart and uncloying like a good gin fizz, a generous pouring-forth of details and dialogue about social classes and the institutions that prop them up. The Tender Bar is quite simply...wunderbar!"

"[An] exquisite memoir...The book, by turns hilarious and poignant, evokes the fascinating characters who become the author's surrogate fathers, as well as his coming of age on a bar stool."

"This vivid, funny, poignant, compassionate, and surprising 100-proof memoir goes down easy and leaves no hangover in its wake....Moehringer's animated portrayals of men with robust hearts, painful secrets, and rampant senses of humor, who find comaraderie and empathy in a sheltering bar, are radiant in their understanding and love"

"It would have been easy for Moehringer to drift into sentimentality about growing up fatherless. Instead, he took the hard route and wrote the heck out of the thing. Moehringer paints a portrait of his life--and the bar full of men who stepped in to do the job his father couldn't--that is vivid, alive, and painfully honest. It's also pretty darn funny."

"A straight-up account of masculinity, maturity, and memory that leaves a smile on the face and an ache in the heart."

"Moehringer keeps you glued to your barstool til last call."

"A wonderful read...clear-eyed and tough sentiment."

"Refreshing....The author has an unerring ear for the sights, sounds, and smells."

"[The Tender Bar] is a success story."

"Moehringer set out to write a memoir trying to explain how much he loves the bar that played such a big role in his life. He succeeded in making us love it as much as he does."

"A good memoir is a survivor's tale, the story of a person who has faced obstacles and made it through well enough to tell it. Moehringer's memoir, better than most, illuminates the fact that every life is a survivor's tale--we made it this far, didn't we? Funny, frank, sad, and bursting with life, The Tender Bar is irresistible."