I arrived home late last night from the Kansas City Worldcon, where I visited seven BBQ joints and recorded five more episodes of Eating the Fantastic. But before we get to any of those, it’s time for the first of three episodes captured during last month’s Readercon.

My guest and I wandered off from the con hotel to Quincy’s Pad Thai, from which Deval Patrick, the former governor of Massachusetts, seems to have ordered takeout a lot.

Joining me was Resa Nelson, whose story “The Dragonslayer’s Sword” I published in the first issue of Science Fiction Age. My decision to purchase the story was validated when at the end of our first year, I tabulated thousands of subscriber surveys and discovered readers had voted that tale their second-favorite story—and their #1 fantasy.

We discussed how the short story of hers I’d published in Science Fiction Age grew into not just a single novel, but a series of novels, why she watches the Japanese movie The Mystery of Rampo before beginning any new writing project, what she learned from the hundreds of film interviews she did for Realms of Fantasy magazine, and more.

Here’s how you can pull up a chair to the table—

1) Subscribe at the iTunes store, where you can also download a few of the first 15 episodes.

2) Use the RSS feed of http://eatingthefantastic.libsyn.com/rss to grab it for whatever device you use to listen to your podcasts.

3) Or simply click the embed below.

And here, as promised at the end of the podcast, is what Resa and I had for lunch.

Scallion pancakes

Yellow curry with duck

Ginger and scallion beef

The next episode will feature Jeffrey Ford, followed by F. Brett Cox.

And after that? Since all of my Worldcon plans came off, you’ll be able to listen in on meals with David D. Levine, Adam-Troy Castro, Alyssa Wong, Kathleen Ann Goonan, and Robert Reed. Why not subscribe so you get to hear them first?