LeseLust & LeseLiebe

Being a con artist, and on pretty much everyone’s most-wanted list, Julep Dupree doesn’t think about food very often. But there is a certain beverage that she cannot live without… “I like my froofy drinks froofy and my blue-collar brew as bitter as burned oven scrapings.” ~Julep Dupree Her favorite haunt is Café Ballou, a coffee shop within walking distance of St. Agatha’s, the fancy Catholic private school she attends. She’s at the Ballou more often than not, especially once her father goes missing and her apartment turns not as safe as it used to be. As a con artist, though, it would be against her moral code to pay for coffee. So, in the interest of seeing a master at work, let’s watch her con her way into a cup of her favorite fuel.       It takes me longer than most people to order coffee, because I’m chatting up the cashier to finagle a free drink. It’s not hard. Especially at a chain, which is more likely selling the coffee-shop experience than the coffee. But even...

I’ve never thought about the food in Some Act of Vision , but what a great question to ask about characters: But what are they eating? I suppose the title of Chapter Two is most appropriate for today’s guest post: “Eat Something.” Jordan Walker is a ballet dancer, and as a former dancer, I can attest to the strange relationship that dancers have had (historically) with food. I think it’s getting better now, but when I was a teenager, food was a topic fraught with anxiety and wish-fulfillment. I was always hungry—I loved food, and especially sweets—but my anxiety about the way my body was supposed to look according to magazines and other dancers made me love-hate food. I’d love whatever it was I was eating, but later “hate” that same food when around my friends. Thankfully, things have changed since the 80s, and we’re raising girls and boys with smarter approaches to body image. Jordan Walker’s father reminds her to eat something—anything—as he stands at the counter and wolfs down his ...

Samm is like every other detective tracking their target. That is, if every other detective is a demon banished from Hell and their target is an escaped rabid soul! At its heart, the comedy-fantasy world of Little Idiots is a detective novel where demons are the good guys, humans are ridiculous and angels have bad attitudes. Samm is nothing more than a horned Sam Spade, and like any hard-boiled detective, food never touches his lips; he subsides on cigarettes and booze. And man, does the booze ever flow. Alcohol is Samm's solution to all problems - get beat up by demon mafiosos? Have a drink. Angel trying to assassinate you? Have a drink. Your apprentice bringing home Cerberus' stray puppies? Have a drink. And put newspapers down on the floor. Lots of newspapers. The main location in the novel is set in the bar of the recently deceased Evil Moe, which supplies not only Samm with ample drink, but also the characters around him, from human detective Barney Little (Scotch on the r...

What are my characters eating in Willow Creek, Pennsylvania, deep in the heart of Amish country? Anything sweet or hearty that will accompany tea. Daisy Swanson and her Aunt Iris co-own Daisy’s Tea Garden in Willow Creek. Many of the foods my characters enjoy are based on Pennsylvania Dutch cooking.  Daisy at the tea garden tries to give them a twist, as does her kitchen manager, her best friend from high school, Tessa Miller.  Daisy’s Tea Garden offers sweet and savory items from potato and leek soup, carrot-grape-pecan salad to lemon tea cakes and cinnamon scones that are involved in solving the murders in this small community.  In each novel I include at least three recipes that have appeared in the mystery. Daisy’s teenage daughters Jazzi (Jasmine) and Vi (Violet), have their own favorites.  Both girls enjoy whoopie pies—soft chocolate cookies with peanut butter cream or vanilla cream centers as well as their mom’s lemon pepper tomato mozzarella salad. Frequent v...

Food doesn’t play a huge role in my book The Wish List , but there is a quirky food item in it. Confession time, because I pulled it out of my own life: My heroine likes to eat Chocolate Chipless Cookies. What are they? As the name says, they’re chocolate chip cookies minus the chocolate chips. I’m not a huge chocolate fan in real life. I will eat it, but it has to have something in it—nuts, peanut butter, butterfinger filling. No fruit. I will eat brownies, but prefer them with vanilla ice cream on top, no chocolate sauce. I prefer white cake to devil’s food, vanilla pudding to chocolate, and plain glazed doughnuts over chocolate ones. I wish they made eclairs without the chocolate covering the top. Oh, and it has to be milk chocolate. I hate dark chocolate. I think most of my tastes are that of an eight year old. You should see my drink choices. When I make chocolate chip cookies, I leave out the chocolate chips. I love the cookie part, all buttery and soft, but the chocolate ruins i...

My novel Bone Music tells the story of Genghis Khan’s rise to power in 13th century Mongolia. The book is part legend, but the food and drink in its pages is real enough, and many of the same foodstuffs are still eaten (and drunk) in Mongolia today. Genghis Khan’s people ate a lot of meat. This would have come both from the herds that travelled with the clans - oxen, horses, camels, yaks, sheep, goats - and also from the wild animals they hunted on the steppes, such as deer, marmots and squirrels. At the start of the book, the boy Temujin (young Genghis) is living in exile with his family after an ambitious chief stole his dead father's people, and must find a way to feed his little brothers: I knew we’d be in trouble if we couldn’t hunt for meat. So I struggled to master Father’s huge bow, hidden by the tall pines where the river raged loud enough to hide my grunts of frustration. My arrow-making skills improved (they had to, since I kept breaking the stupid things). But, no matt...

Regan McHenry and her husband, Tom Kiley, will eat anything, and in the Regan McHenry Real Estate Mysteries series, they’ve had a variety of in-home and in-restaurant meals. Regan even cooked an authentic Columbian meal to try and catch a killer in A Neighborly Killing and has been known to burn dinner because a clue occurred to her as she cooked. In her most recent adventure, The Two-Faced Triplex , Regan explains her plan for getting information about a possible killer out of a reluctant witness to Tom over samosa avocado chat at an Indian restaurant, using her fork to punctuate her thoughts. Fortunately for Regan and Tom, Santa Cruz, California, where they live and work, is a tourist community and has excellent restaurants that run from upscale French to vegan Mexican with everything in between. And there are as many Thai restaurants in the community as there are Starbucks in most urban settings. Regan likes to cook and even has an herb garden so exotic ingredients are ready for th...