Glass Bottle Season tells the story of a small group of high school friends and now recent college graduates who spend their three alcohol-soaked months between graduation and employment in and around their Newport, Rhode Island hometown. Ray, a Cuban-American, scholarship kid, is a welcome member of the group even though he is not, by birth, an elite member of the Newport summer crowd who spends their time between polo matches and yacht parties. Ray works at a liquor store and often bartends at the upper class soirees. Each friend is deciding on which job they they want to take after being recommended for interviews set up by family and friends. Ray, an anthropology major is decided between staying in Newport or enrolling in law school. The novel details the friends as they soak their brains in alcohol and try to make decisions about the rest of their lives. Glass Bottle Season is an sad, interesting read that keeps readers waiting for the inevitable train wreck near the end.

Glass Bottle Season
by Fletcher Michael

I enjoyed this book. It certainly captures Newport R.I.at best and worse. It is a coming of age for the story of Raymond Wilson-Domingo. Raymond has never felt entirely comfortable among the elitist crowd of Newport’s old-money aristocracy—partly because he's Cuban, partly because of his modest upbringing in the city’s undesirable Fifth Ward neighborhood. Raymond wants nothing more than to be part of the elitist circles. But, there are prices to pay.