Hurleyville, NY – The Sullivan County Historical Society will be hosting a book talk by local author Lily Barrish Levner on Saturday, January 25 at 2 p.m. at the Sullivan County Museum in Hurleyville. Refreshments will be served. Admission is free, though donations are always appreciated.
In “Banquets & Bootleg Bounty,” author Lily Barrish Levner transports readers to the summer of 1944 at the Concord Hotel. She pays homage to her paternal grandparents by naming her new novel’s main characters Dotty and Abe after them.
“I was lucky to be alive during the tail end of my grandfather’s career as the maître d’ of Kutsher’s. My grandmother had retired as a waitress by then,” said Barrish Levner.
Those characters will be the mainstays of the entire series, the first four books having already been planned out. The initial novel is the beginning of Dotty and Abe’s careers in the resort industry and involves an associate of Murder, Inc. Book 2 jumps ten years to 1954 and the Golden Era in the mountains. Book 3 skips ahead to 1969 and the Woodstock Festival. Book 4 is set during the couple’s retirement years in Delray Beach, Florida.
Packed with nostalgic charm, Book 1 honors a time of lavish dining rooms, top-notch entertainment, bustling hotels, and vibrant bungalow colonies. Stay tuned for the further adventures of Dotty and Abe when Book 2 of the Catskills Capers series is published in the summer of 2025.
“Like a good meal in a top Catskill resort, Banquets & Bootleg Bounty is scrumptious and filling, and will have you waiting anxiously for the next serving,” said John Conway, Sullivan County Historian.
The paperback can be purchased at the book talk.
About the Author
Barrish Levner has a BA in English/Creative Writing and a Master’s in Library and Information Science. For the past decade, she has been a copy desk researcher at Bloomberg Businessweek while working on her novel and contributing monthly articles to the Hurleyville Sentinel. She lives in the Catskills with her husband and their dog, Gus. The magic of the mountains still influences her work.
