Last night I went to a bar called Novela whose theme was, as their name would suggest, books. Our literary township and eager merchants had finally joined forces in another absurd conceit. The walls were covered with books whose spines were arranged by color, creating a grand rainbow spectrum spanning the entire perimeter. Artist Chris Cobb was the first to do this (to my understanding) in There Is Nothing Wrong in This Whole Wide World (2005), an art installation at Adobe Books, San Francisco. In “Cocktails with Character,” whose eponymous drinks presumed what our favorite protagonists might have enjoyed, I had the “Jay Gatsby,” a mixture of bourbon and Islay scotch I found troublesome, its delicate glass almost ringing under the thud of crass music. Squeaky Asian girls in miniskirts as tight as condoms walked that tight-rope walk of high heels, precariously balanced on a vast floor, at times jutting out their arms for support. I would have offered my shoulder, but I was, it seemed, the “Invisible Man,” whose concoction was just a random drink I found abandoned on a table, its sole candle languidly wavering in the humble radius of its own light.