The fact the Nebula Awards were handed out in Pittsburgh earlier this year meant I was finally able to visit a restaurant I’d been wanting to check out for years. Which was excellent timing, because as it turned out, I got there only a week and a half before it closed.

Conflict Kitchen was based on a fascinating concept—only serve, on a rotating basis, the cuisines of countries with which the U.S. has been in conflict—such as Cuba, North Korea, Iran, and Afghanistan, for example. Unfortunately, after seven years, Carnegie Mellon University decided it would no longer provide administrative support, and so Conflict Kitchen was forced to close its Schenley Plaza restaurant location, perhaps only temporarily, but maybe for good. Luckily, though, not before my guest and I were able to get there for an al fresco Palestinian meal.

Brooke Bolander was on Nebula ballot that weekend in the short story category for “Our Talons Can Crush Galaxies,” and is also on the current Hugo Awards ballot for that same story, one of the most talked-about tales of 2016. Her fiction, which has appeared in Lightspeed, Strange Horizons, Nightmare, Uncanny, and other venues, has been honored by nominations for the Locus and the Theodore Sturgeon awards as well. The Only Harmless Great Thing will be published by Tor in 2018.

We discussed how she ended up as a writer rather than a paleontologist, why the videogame Ecco the Dolphin terrified her but taught her to love science fiction, her early days writing fan fiction, how anger over the electrocution of Topsy the elephant and the deaths of the “radium girls” inspired her newest novella, why she avoids rereading her own writing, what broke the writers block that had gripped her for several years, and more.

Here’s how you can join us for falafel— (more…)