This time around, I invite you to take a seat at the table on a sunny patio for lunch with writer John Appel.

John’s debut novel Assassin’s Orbit, published last year, was a finalist for the 2022 Compton Crook Award. He’s a former US Army paratrooper, a long-time information security professional, a historical fencer, and a life-long gamer who’s written the occasional tabletop RPG adventure. He co-edited the anthology Skies of Wonder, Skies of Danger along with Mary Alexandra Agner. John’s also a graduate of the Viable Paradise workshop and a founding member of the Maryland Space Opera Collective writing group.

We met for lunch at the White Oak Tavern, which is in the Enchanted Forest Shopping Center in Ellicott City, Maryland, and if there was ever a proper place to record an episode of Eating the Fantastic, an Enchanted Forest certainly sounds like it.

We discussed how pitching his debut novel as “Battlestar Galactica meets Golden Girls” got him an agent, why his background in table-top RPGs might be the reason he writes novels rather than short stories, how he deals with the “candy bar” scenes of his plots, the way critique groups and sensitivity readers can help make books better, how to juggle multiple viewpoints and still have them all be equally compelling, the political aspects of his novel which make it a different read than it would have been when it was first begun, his particular set of skills which helped bring fight scenes alive, and much more.

Here’s how you can join us —

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3) Or simply listen via the embed below.

Here’s what we nibbled as we chatted —

Baked White Cheddar Cornbread
with chipotle butter and scallions

Scott’s Brisket Hash
house-smoked shredded grass-fed brisket, fried red potatoes,
red onion, wilted greens, poached farm eggs,
french gray salt,bacon bits

John’s White Oak Burger
dry-aged, grass-fed beef, porter-glazed caramelized onions,
The White Oak Special Sauce, arugula, aged white cheddar,
brioche bun, served with house-made ketchup

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Please join me two weeks from now to eavesdrop on my lunch with writer Steven R. Southard, who dropped by my neck of the woods for brunch while driving from Maryland to Texas.

Thanks for listening!