Known for his fiery prose and superb storytelling, Rhode Island-born, South Korea-bred author Alexander Chee broke into the literary world five years ago with a harrowing coming-of-age debut novel, Edinburgh. With it Chee scored the Michener-Copernicus Prize, the Asian American Writers' Workshop Literary Award, the Lambda Editor's Choice Prize, and Best Book of the Year honors from Publisher's Weekly. Not surprisingly, Chee, who is currently at work on his follow up, Queen of The Night (which takes place in Paris), recently relocated to Massachusetts’ the Berkshires – an area that acclaimed literati like W.E.B. Dubois, Herman Melville, and Nathaniel Hawthorne once called home.

From the MASS MoCA, to Amherst College, and all of the galleries and antique shops in between, the Berkshires have long been a designated tourist attraction. Thus, just in time to see the leaves turn, psychoPEDIA enlisted Chee’s help in garnering a Berkshires insider’s best-of list. Here, Chee tells of his adventures as a New England gourmand, and his dedicated drinking habits as a literary luminary. In his own words:

How long have you been living in the Berkshires?
A little over a year.

Are the Berkshires a place you chose as a writing environment, or was the creative writing position at Amherst your main reason to move there?
I went there because of the job, which gives me a lot of time and space to write.

How do you typically start your day in the Berkshires?
I usually get up and go to one of two coffee shops. There is astoundingly excellent coffee in Amherst [thanks to] the two guys who own Amherst Coffee, and this other guy, Scott Rao, who set up Esselon Café. I usually go to either one of those places. Amherst Coffee is good day or night, because they serve alcohol after four. They have amazing bourbons, rye whiskeys, scotches, and Italian wines.

Do you eat out?
I usually cook at home; there are only a few restaurants. There’s an excellent French restaurant, Chez Albert. They have a small menu but everything they do, they do very well. They do an amazing duck confit; they also do spectacular River Trout. The Maitre’d always takes care of me. There’s another restaurant called Tabella- it’s a tapas place. They tell you the farms that the pork, and beef, and the chicken came from.

Would you say Amherst is a college town?
It’s very much a college town. I think, as far as a college town goes, Amherst is ideal. It’s very compact; the things that are there, they’re not many of them but they’re excellent, like the independent theater—Amherst Cinema.

What hotels you would highly recommend to out-of-towners?
In Amherst, the Lord Jeffery Inn is the one. Also, the Hotel Northampton.

The Berkshires is definitely known for its cultural attractions – galleries, museums, etc. Are there any outdoorsy activities that locals participate in as well?
Swimming hole culture is huge there. Everyone has like five that they go to; some are legal some are not. It was funny because, when I first arrived, I had to figure out if somebody told me that a swimming hole was clothing optional, ‘are they coming on to me or is it just information?’ [I found] that very charming… it was interesting in terms of gay culture. A lot of people say that it’s very lesbian-oriented out there and there are not a lot of gay men, but, actually, they’re just all in the woods. I’ve also started playing tennis and rowing on the Connecticut River. The Yankee Rowing Club is, for example, an adult rowing club. The river is amazing.

You grew up around the ocean right?
I did, and I have to say, I’d always felt a little bit of disdain for fresh water, but no longer. I’m enjoying the river. The tennis was a big surprise for me. I always hated tennis growing up, and people who play tennis.

What about Berkshires nightlife? Are there any staple bars that you frequent?
There are these two sister bars— The Moan and Dove and Dirty Truth. One is in Northampton, one’s in South Amherst. They have their bartenders go to Germany for beer training. They’re really serious about it. At the Dirty Truth, they had a keg of this Belgian beer called Bink. It’s almost impossible to get, so they wrote it in really small letters on the menu.

Any good places to hang out during the daytime?
Another hotspot for me is Lady Killigrew Café at the Montague Bookmill, a used bookstore in an old flour mill. That’s one of the places where I like to work, because it’s very quiet and I feel like I vanish, which is nice. It’s actually owned by a professional online poker player. I met him at Amherst Coffee and we did this disgusting shot together called the Italian car bomb. It’s a pint glass that you fill halfway with red wine, then you take expresso and a shot of grappa, drop it in the glass, and drink the whole thing at once.

I’ve never heard of that before…
It tastes like somebody shoving your face into a leather car seat.

What type of drinker would you say you are?
I would say, I’m in the long tradition of writers who drink seriously and are about three fourths of the way to becoming alcoholic. I mean part of it is the culture up there, at Amherst college we enjoy a good martini.

~Hunter Walker