Writer Tom Doyle and I recorded Episode 4 of Eating the Fantastic at Ethiopic Ethiopian restaurant nearby the Capitol, the Supreme Court, and Union Station in Washington D.C.—which unless I’m mistaken has the largest Ethiopian population outside of Ethiopia after so many resettled here during the ‘70s and ‘80s.

Tom’s the author of a contemporary fantasy series from Tor which began in 2014 with American Craftsmen, returned in 2015 with The Left Hand Way, and continues in the third installment War and Craft—the manuscript of which he handed in to his editor mere days before we met.

We talked about how what was was originally pitched as a standalone novel turned into a surprise trilogy, his fascination with apocalyptic fiction, what effect the Clarion workshop had on his growth as a writer, and much more.

Here’s how you can listen in—

1) You can subscribe at the iTunes store (and perhaps download some of the older episodes while there as well).

2) You can use the RSS feed of http://eatingthefantastic.libsyn.com/rss to download episodes to the device of your choice.

3) Or if you’d prefer, you can listen directly below.

And if you want to take a look at what we were eating during the episode rather than merely listening to us eat, check out the pics below.

To start … some bread

Vegetarian sampler
Gomen, miser wot, kik aletcha, and dinich wot

Beef and chicken wot sampler
Minchet abish aletcha wot, doro key wot, doro aletcha wot, and key sega wot

And now I’m hungry all over again!

If all goes as planned, the fifth episode of Eating the Fantastic will feature Nebula, Hugo, and Tiptree-award nominated author Carolyn Ives Gilman. I hope you’ll join me then! (And if you subscribe on iTunes, you’ll do so automatically!)