Elizabeth Bear and Scott Lynch joined Howard and Dan at GenCon Indy to talk about fantasy food, and how we engage our readers’ appetites with our fiction. We talk economics, logistics, sensory engagement, and we goof off quite a bit in the process. We might have been hungry at the time. There is good fun to be had here, and plenty of (pun intended) food for thought.
Credits: This episode was mastered by Alex Jackson, and was made possible by the generous support of the GenCon Indy Writer’s Symposium, and the Writing Excuses patrons at Patreon.
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Go out and cook something!
(Also, take a character of your own, who is beloved by you, and turn them into the antagonist in someone else’s story.)
Karen Memory, by Elizabeth Bear, narrated by Jennifer Grace
It’s the second time Scott Lynch appears on the podcast, and once again I’m laughing my ass off while also somehow learning a lot. I think he’s my favorite guest. Thanks for having him on once again!
Hahaha. I think this was the funniest episode I’ve listened to. So good. Highly entertaining and educational!
Fun episode.
Ms. Bear spoke of the logistics of food, and I recalled this example: A scene from the Count of Monte Cristo where Edmond Dantes hosts a feast consisting of exotic seafoods, and other things (I don’t remember) that could not possibly be served together in the world of the story except at great expense. The scene served to showcase the Count’s fabulous wealth, and the great lengths he was willing to go to.
So glad to see this episode, because this is an idea I think about a lot, and I like to see it getting some attention.
For the most part, we all eat! And when Elizabeth Bear and Scott Lynch get together with Howard Tayler and Dan Wells to talk about food in fantasy and science fiction, the pot fills up quickly! Potatoes, oysters, lobsters, roasted marmots, trade routes, peasants, even bladder stones all get tossed and turned, for a bit of tasty stew (or was that ceviche?) spiced with laughter. And now, you can read the transcript in the archives or over here
http://wetranscripts.livejournal.com/124044.html
Warning! You may never look at McDonald’s fries the same way again after enjoying this episode. Now go eat.
A good (and entertaining) resource for food history is the show Supersizers Go…. they spend a week eating the typical food of a particular time period (from Roman times to the 1980s), show something of how it’s prepared, and tie it into the culture(s), economy, beliefs and lifestyle of the time, and even how a week on the historical diet has affected their health. You can find a lot of them on Youtube. Not super in-depth but definitely a great source for ideas and getting past some of our preconceptions!
That’s awesome. Thanks.
I can’t help thinking about this novel, based on the premise that In Teh Future, food will be obsolete: https://www.amazon.com/Hungry-H-Swain/dp/1250028299