Smitty's Guide to Interstellar Bartending

Smitty just wanted to pour drinks and drift from town to town. Getting abducted by aliens? Not on the itinerary. But when a busted memory-wiper leaves two grumpy Martians with a very awake, very talkative human on their hands, Smitty talks his way off Earth and onto Goulaub Station — a crossroads space station orbiting a star that might go supernova any millennium now.

Stranded among tentacled commuters, stone-skinned muggers, and constables who charge you for the oxygen you breathe, Smitty does the only thing he knows how to do: he opens a bar. Because whether your customers have three heads or eyes on stalks, they still need somewhere to complain about their bosses, their spouses, and the price of a decent drink.

With help from an unlikely crew — and constant interference from rival lounges, corrupt officials, and the worst house band in the galaxy — Smitty mixes cocktails, dodges shakedowns, and stumbles into a revolution or two. Along the way he learns that running a bar in deep space involves a whole lot more than pouring A into B and stirring.

Equal parts Hitchhiker’s Guide whimsy and Cheers-style charm, this is a laugh-out-loud comic space opera about the universal need for a good pour, a listening ear, and a stool at the end of the bar. Aliens may have stone skin and memory-wipe fluid, but their troubles — lousy jobs, power-hungry bosses, and the hunt for a proper cocktail — will feel achingly, hilariously familiar.

Pull up a bar stool. The glassware’s polished. The cocktails are served. And if you’re lucky, you’ll miss the Hyperbolics’ setlist.

Ray Tabler is a retired engineer and author, originally from Louisville, Kentucky. He chased the north-bound dollar to Michigan because of a tragic addiction to a steady paycheck, where he married a lovely Yankee girl. Several decades later, despite the siren call of warmer climes, Ray might be permanently lodged in the frozen north. He writes upbeat, humorous science fiction, and aims to entertain. Think Starship Troopers, hijacked by Monty Python. Smitty's Guide to Interstellar Bartending is Ray's fifth novel.