Shelley Workinger's Blog, page 23

Please Welcome Patricia Obermeier Neuman & Rosalind Burgess, Authors of Lethal Property

Food is important to Kit. Not really the eating of it, but more the preparation, the cooking, and the reviews from her adoring diners. Her BFF, Val, is a regular recipient of Kit’s fantastic cuisine, but left to her own devices, she is just as happy with a bowl of Cheerios while watching TV in bed.

     “Got time for a breakfast taco, Val?” Kit asked.
     “With chorizo sausage?”
     “Naturally.”

In Lethal Property a serial killer is on the loose in Downers Grove. It begins with Val, a Realtor, showing a house to a mysterious man who seems to have more than the purchase of real estate on his mind. Even more alarming is the fact that the string of murders that ensue seem to implicate Val and threaten her safety.



More:

https://bookfare.blogspot.com/2017/05...

FOODFIC Look at The Ice Maiden

I like crime reporter Britt Montero. Yes, I like her for all the usual reasons – she’s smart, tough, relatable and all that.

But I also like that she can feel sympathy for a perp, even when she didn’t expect to; she learns the story of his childhood trauma and can see shades of gray.

And I like that she prefers cocktails to beer. Really, how can a Coors Light compete with rum, coconut cream, pineapple, and orange juice?

More:
https://bookfare.blogspot.com/2017/04...

Please Welcome John W. Mefford, Author of IN Doubt

Have you ever participated in one of those silent auctions? You know the ones, where a charity offers up themed gift baskets, tickets to a sporting event or a concert, or, possibly, a chef-prepared meal by one of the top chefs in the country.

Well, that’s how Ivy Nash—the protagonist in my bestselling mystery-thriller series—happens to hit the food lottery in my latest novel, IN Doubt (due out on May 5). With her and her old / new flame, Saul, sitting at his kitchen table, they watch a famed chef personally cook them a meal that might normally cost north of five hundred dollars. They start with Texas gulf crab cakes, with tomatillo-poblano cream and jicama-tortilla slaw. And then they reach the main course: wood-grilled pork tenderloin, with jalapeno-charred corn, drizzled with Texas peach barbeque sauce.

Ivy, a former CPS Special Investigator in Texas, has never had much money. In fact, food is usually not much of a priority because all of her energy is focused on helping troubled kids. It’s her passion…

More:
https://bookfare.blogspot.com/2017/04...

Please Welcome A.G. Moye, Author of Cronicles of the Marauder

In the near future; 100,000 light-years from Earth aboard the faster than light starship Marauder, Captain Neil Armstrong Andrews sat down for dinner to enjoy fresh vegetables from the hydroponics garden with vat grown artificial meat. After their narrow escape from the aliens that wanted to enslave them and near destruction of the Marauder, they were hiding doing repairs to the ship. I now present for your enjoyment, one scene in the story for you to get the flavor of dinner aboard the Marauder.

More:
https://bookfare.blogspot.com/2017/04...

Please Welcome Laurence O'Bryan, Author of The Cairo Puzzle

In early February, just gone, I spent three days in Cairo researching my upcoming mystery novel, The Cairo Puzzle. Cairo is an extraordinary city, the largest between Mexico city and India, far larger than any in Europe.

Twenty million people in the metro area makes for a dense and bustling space, filled with beeping cars at all hours of the day and night. My main reason for going there was to get inside the Great Pyramid to visit the King’s Chamber, which I succeeded in doing. To see the small, claustrophobic main passage inside the pyramid in 360VR, possibly the first such view ever, click here.

More:
https://bookfare.blogspot.com/2017/04...

Please Welcome Merry Jones, Author of Child's Play

Don’t get it wrong: Child's Play is not a children’s book. Nor is it a book about games and toys, or the importance of either.

No, Child's Play is a dark and shadowy thriller that begins in an elementary school. And however slightly, food plays a part in the story...

More:
https://bookfare.blogspot.com/2017/03...

Please Welcome Joni Parker, Author of Gossamer

In Gossamer, Lady Alex attempts a daring rescue of her grandmother and her friend who are being held hostage by rebel soldiers and uncovers a plot of betrayal and deception that reaches to the very pinnacle of power in Eledon.

But what are they eating, you ask? I’ve never had anyone ask before.

Alex is one of those lucky people who can eat almost anything and doesn’t have to worry about her weight. She’s as comfortable eating at the table of her cousin, Prince Darin, as she is around a campfire...

More:
https://bookfare.blogspot.com/2017/03...

Please Welcome Pendred Noyce, Author of The Cryptic Case of the Coded Fair

REFRESHMENT IN THE HOUSE OF WISDOM

In the House of Wisdom, the scholar and mathematician al-Kindi offers Ella and Shomari refreshment. The year is 841 CE, and the city is Baghdad, center of culture and government for the caliphate. The two time-traveling middle-schoolers are visiting to learn from the master about how to decode a secret message. Food puts them at ease.

The teenagers drink cardamom coffee and fruit juice. They nibble on apricots, nuts and dates from Persia as al-Kindi discusses his theories on the origin of the universe, the benefits of trade and the importance of religious tolerance. Finally, he shares his method to decode any substitution cipher. The food and conversation contrast with the menacing behavior of the guards who swarmed Ella and Shomari on their arrival...

More:
https://bookfare.blogspot.com/2017/03...

Please Welcome Pete Morin, Author of Half Irish

In 1993, I was fined a trivial sum by the Massachusetts State Ethics Commission for allowing a friend of mine to pay for my Osso Buco (and a few martinis as well). I had no idea at the time that would become the focal point of a novel I would write sixteen years later:

“What is ‘osso buco’?”
“Braised veal shank. It’s a northern Italian staple. Delicious.”

While the novel represented a radical fictionalization of events surrounding the federal indictment of that friend (he was just as generous to many others), the novel’s treatment of gastronomie is as true as I can tell it, as are the two following sequels, Full Irish and Half Irish.

I cannot say I did this consciously. The vast majority of Diary of a Small Fish I wrote merely as a scribe for a bunch of characters who evanesced in my imagination and dictated to me like I was paid a penny a word. Apparently, they liked food, too. This leads me to suspect that they are all alter egos, at least as it comes to the culinary arts.

https://bookfare.blogspot.com/2017/03...

Please Welcome June McCullough, Author of On the Other Hand

It wasn’t that long ago that if asked to compare her life to food, Nina Andrews would have described it as rich, enticing, and fulfilling. She would have gone on to recite the menu. Begin the meal with escargot covered with a rich garlic butter. Next a Caprese salad which consists of ripe tomato and fresh mozzarella cheese, sprinkled with just a drizzle of olive oil. For the main course veal fillet cooked perfectly in a Port wine sauce and a bottle of Pinot Noir to enhance the succulent flavours. And, to complete the meal, a variety of cheeses and fruit served with a coffee.

If asked that same question now, her response would be tasteless and empty. Her meal, when she had one, was a frozen dinner picked up at her corner grocery store and the closest she came to having fruit these days was the grapes used to make the bottle of wine she drank each night.

On the Other Hand is the story of one woman’s journey after being suddenly widowed. Nina Andrews loved her life and considered it to be close to perfect...

https://bookfare.blogspot.com/2017/02...