Welcome to an entirely unexpected episode of Eating the Fantastic. Why, one could almost call it an historic episode! In fact, I won’t almost call it historic — I will call it historic. Because it’s the only episode since this podcast began during which you’ll hear me chat with a creator while we eat a flavor of ice cream inspired by their latest book — in this case, Sarah Pinsker’s Haunt Sweet Home — created by the Baltimore ice cream experts at The Charmery.

Sarah’s no stranger to longtime listeners of the show. She was my first guest way back on Episode 1 in February 2016, my first virtual pandemic guest, during which we recorded while we each ate similar takeout in our own homes in April 2020 on Episode 120 — that was when we discussed her unintentionally prescient debut novel A Song for a New Day — and a guest once again on Episode 151 in August 2021, when she was joined by Karen Osborne and K. M. Szpara, since they’d all recently published second novels.

Here’s Sarah’s bio from the back flap of Haunt Sweet Home —

Sarah Pinsker is the Hugo, Nebula, and Philip K Dick Award winning author of A Song For A New Day, We Are Satellites, Sooner or Later Everything Falls Into the Sea, Lost Places, and over sixty works of short fiction. Her stories have appeared in Asimov’s, Strange Horizons, Fantasy & Science Fiction, and Uncanny, and in numerous anthologies and year’s bests. She is also a singer/songwriter with four albums on various independent labels. She lives in Baltimore, Maryland with her wife and two weird dogs.

The flavor launched on Friday the 13th, and we met at The Charmery yesterday for a taste of that book-inspired ice cream, where we discussed the sculpture she saw at the American Visionary Art Museum which planted a seed for Haunt Sweet Home, the origin of the ice cream collaboration, how she knew her idea was meant to be a novella and not a novel, why she prefers writing books without a contract, how multiple ideas coalesced into one, the narrative purpose of telling a story via multiple formats, how to know a character who doesn’t know themselves, why you can’t tell from the end product whether a piece of fiction was plotted or pantsed, Kelly Robson’s theory about the Han Solo/Luke Skywalker dichotomy and what it means for creating interesting characters, why she’s a fan of making promises in the early paragraphs of her stories, whether our families understand what we’re writing about when we write about families, and much more.

Here’s how you can join us for ice cream at The Charmery — (more…)

I love Eating the Fantastic’s lightning-round donut episodes, for which I park myself in a heavily trafficked area of a con with a dozen donuts and chat with anybody who’s up for trading five minutes of talk for a freebie. It’s a fun contrast to my usual well-researched one-on-one conversations, in that it’s completely spontaneous, since I never know the identities of my guests until their eyes alight on my donuts and they choose themselves.

In 2016, listeners were able to eavesdrop on the Readercon Donut Spectacular, then in 2017 the Balticon Donut Extravaganza, in 2018 the Nebula Awards Donut Jamboree, and in 2019 — before the pandemic forced me to take a break from such things — the StokerCon Donut Spooktacular.

Because Capclave — which ended the day before yesterday as this episode goes live — not only has a patio, but this year, unlike last, had weather warm enough for us to gather there, I was able to bring back that tradition. On Saturday afternoon, I sat down out on the patio with two boxes of donuts from Donut King in Kensington, Maryland, and waited for potential guests to materialize.

So join us during the lightning-round Capclave Donut Carnival, where you’ll hear R. Z. Held and me bond over rejection, David Hacker explain his love of listening to writers read, Michael Dirda recall why Orson Scott Card once kneeled before him on an elevator, James Morrow share his fascination with Charles Darwin, how Katy Lewis found her husband through Dungeons and Dragons, Michael Walsh’s favorite moment as a con chair (which involved Howard Waldrop, Gardner Dozois, and George R. R. Martin), Bill Lawhorn clarify the creation of the bronze dodo, Sarah Pinsker reveal how and why her first science fiction convention was Capclave, Adeena Mignogna explain why space is cool but space travel gets really hot, Mike Zipzer’s memories of Terry Pratchett’s surprise visit, Sarah Mitchell’s arranging of a secret con wedding, Sunny Moraine opine on how the world’s response to COVID-19 changes our ideas of what would happen in a real-world zombie apocalypse, John Pomeranz chat about how the infamous Disclave Great Flood thrust him into being a hotel liaison — and much more!

Here’s how you can dig into those donuts with us — (more…)

Earlier this year, Karen Osborne, Sarah Pinsker, and K. M. Szpara — all previous guests of this podcast — became members of a very special club —

Karen Osborne, who recently appeared on Episode 146, published second novel Engines of Oblivion on February 9.

K. M. Szpara, whose origin story you learned about in Episode 35, published his second novel First, Become Ashes on Apr 6.

And Sarah Pinsker, who kicked off this podcast way back in Episode 1 and then returned four years later to catch up in episode 120, published her second novel We Are Satellites on May 11.

Once I realized three talented and talkative suddenly sophomore authors all lived close enough to get together for a round table where we could discuss that shared experience, I knew it was too good an opportunity to waste.

What are the joys and challenges of writing and publishing a second book? Writers can take their entire lives to get their first novels published, after which creating another novel in a year — or sometimes less — can be major pressure. After giving everything they had to the first novel — how does a writer decide what’s worth writing next? Do they fear they won’t live up to the promise of their debut, and might disappoint readers? I had a wonderful time listening to this trio of second novelists opening up about their experiences, and I hope you will too.

We chatted while nibbling on takeout from Baltimore’s Zaatar Mediterranean Cuisine, and about two-thirds of the way through, switched up to doughnuts from my favorite such spot in Baltimore — Diablo Doughnuts.

We discussed why “second books are weird,” what (if anything) they learned writing their debuts which made book two easier, why pantsing is a thing of the past, whether book two had them concerned about creating a brand, how writing acknowledgements for second novels can be strange, the way deadlines made taking time off between books impossible, the dangers of being abandoned by debut culture, the fear of fewer pre-publication eyeballs on book two, how the pandemic will affect the creation of future novels, and much more.

Here’s how you can take a seat at the virtual table with us — (more…)

Since restaurants began closing down and social distancing became the sensible thing to do for my health, the health of potential podcast guests, and the health of the herd, listeners have been suggesting I consider recording episodes of Eating the Fantastic remotely … and I’ve resisted. Because my purpose here is to share the magical, intimate, relaxed conversations which occur best when people are chatting face-to-face over a table filled with food. That’s why last episode, I ended up letting you ask me the questions.

But then it occurred to me — there’s one person on the planet — and only one — with whom I was willing to record remotely. And that person is Sarah Pinsker, my guest on Episode 1 of this podcast four years and two months ago. I intended to catch up with her in meatspace anyway all these years later, but suddenly it felt right for us to chat in cyberspace.

The reason I felt that way is due to her wonderful debut novel, A Song for A New Day, which was published in September 2019. It’s set in a near future where due to a terrorist attack and an accompanying pandemic, all mass gatherings are banned — no concerts, no sporting events, no ways for people to come together the way people have done since the beginning of time — and we’re instead only allowed to meet in VR. So meeting up with Sarah remotely made artistic and poetic sense — because it would almost be as if we were living in the world of her novel.

Since that first episode, Sarah’s short story collection Sooner or Later Everything Falls into the Sea was published in March of last year by Small Beer Press. It includes many award-nominated and award-winning stories, including her Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award-winning “In Joy, Knowing the Abyss Behind,” and her Nebula Award winner “Our Lady of the Open Road.” The collection as a whole was recently awarded the Philip K. Dick Award. 


Her novel A Song for a New Day is currently a finalist for this year’s Nebula Award. She’s also a Hugo Award finalist for Best Novelette for “The Blur in the Corner of Your Eye,” published last year in Uncanny Magazine.

We discussed how relieved she was her pandemic novel A Song for a New Day was published in 2019 rather than 2020, why she originally wrote that book in a song format (and why that had to change), how she loves being surprised by her own characters, why neither of us can bear listening to music while we write, the extremely scientific, color-coded process she came up with for organizing her first short story collection, how one of her favorite fictional tropes led to the creation of the original story she wrote specifically for that collection, why the thing that most interests her is the way people cope with what’s put in front of them rather than why those things happen, the reason she prefers leaving interpretations to readers rather than providing answers, her terrible habit when reading collections and anthologies, how she’s coping with the surreal feeling of living in the world of her novel, and much more.

Here’s how you can eavesdrop on our conversation — (more…)

Sometimes, when I’m speaking to friends about my food adventures, they seem to think I’m only about tweezer food, molecular gastronomy, and expensive restaurants. And since any new friends I made during the Nebula Awards weekend might have encountered my previous post about Morcilla as their first entry point into my life, I figured I’d better quickly prove that’s just not so, and describe the sandwich I ate many hours after the banquet, at 2:30 a.m. on Saturday night Sunday morning at Primanti’s.

Though Primanti’s is today a chain which includes locations in Indiana, Maryland, Michigan, and other states, the company began with a single restaurant in Pittsburgh in 1933. Not too long after that, it developed its signature way of serving sandwiches—with the french fries and cold slaw in the sandwich. That style is so much a part of Primanti’s I can recall what a server there said when asked in a video interview how they’d respond to a customer if one asked for the fries on the side—she’d tell them there was a Subway down the street.

Perhaps I’m misremembering, and that’s apocryphal, but Primanti’s commitment to keeping what’s normally outside inside has resulted in one of the most famous sandwiches in the U.S. So I had to have one.

I had to have one at the original Pittsburgh location, which is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

And I had to have one not at a standard meal time, but late. Or depending on how you consider time, early.

Which is how I ended up with a group of friends, including Andrea Tatjana and K. M. Szpara, at 2:30 in the morning, still wearing the purple jacket I’d worn to the Nebula banquet. (more…)

Just as I foretold, I spent Friday and Saturday participating in the Baltimore Book Festival. And I even have proof. See?

My name on the program board at the Science Fiction Writers of America tent!

I took part in four programming items—here I am (in a photo taken by Sam J. Miller) with Lara Elena Donnelly as I pontificate on Friday’s “The Future of Science Fiction & Fantasy” panel.

I had a great deal of fun hanging out with friends and interacting with readers, so much so I regret I didn’t stay on for today’s third day of the festival. And as usual, a lot of the fun took place outside the confines of the official event itself. (more…)

Are you ready to have lunch with me and writer/musician Sarah Pinsker? Because the first episode of Eating the Fantastic is now live!

If you want more details about what the Eating the Fantastic podcast is all about, check out my earlier post.

But if you’re a TL;DR type of podcast listener, then simply click play below and join Sarah and me for lunch at Baltimore’s Family Meal.

I hope to eventually get Eating the Fantastic into the iTunes store so you’ll be able to listen on the go, but until then, I think you should still find the episodes enjoyable enough to listen to here.

UPDATE: Eating the Fantastic has been accepted and added to the iTunes store. You can now check it out and subscribe here!

And if you’d like see what the two of us were putting in our mouths on Sunday rather than just being teased by our descriptions (and quite audible groans), check out the photos below. (more…)

Over on Twitter and Facebook, I’ve been teasing a SEKRIT PROJEKT which I would only unveil once I was 100% sure I was going to proceed.

And after having had lunch with Sarah Pinsker this afternoon, I have my answer—I am going to proceed!

“What,” you may be thinking, “could lunch with Sarah Pinsker possibly have to do with a sekrit projekt?” (more…)

How terrible is the bandwidth of my Internet provider?

So terrible that the following video of Sarah Pinsker reading a short story on October 17 at Capclave would have taken me 20+ hours to upload at home, while at the same time choking all other Internet usage.

Which meant I instead waited a month to share it with you, until I was at the World Fantasy Convention hotel where I could use 21st Century Internet to upload the 1.22 Gigabyte file in a tenth of the time as my apparently steam-powered Internet.

Enjoy!

If you want to see more of what Capclave can offer, here are some videos from 2014.