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Since my characters work at the Storybook Valley fairy tale theme park, they get to have lots of yummy park food like fried dough, caramel apples, popcorn, and best of all the baked gingerbread men and cinnamon doughnuts from the Little Red Hen Bakery. Jaine gets lots of perks from being the park’s marketing coordinator and temporary Cinderella.

Her sexy boss Dylan is a whiz at making homemade lemonade from his years of working at the park as a teenager. He likes to offer Jaine freshly squeezed lemonade when he needs a favor. But he does have a romantic side also, and arranged a private picnic in the woods for their first date. Jaine couldn’t believe the assortment of crispy breads wrapped in parchment paper, savory biscuits and homemade preserves, cold meats and cheeses, a container of Greek style pasta salad, plump green grapes, fruit skewers, and brownies.

For more about the Storybook Valley menu, check out Fooling Around With Cinderella!









And find Cinderella here:


What happens when the glass slippers pinch Cinderella's toes? When Jaine Andersen proposes a new marketing role to the local amusement park, general manager Dylan Callahan charms her into filling Cinderella’s glass slippers for the summer. Her reign transforms Jaine’s ordinary life into chaos that would bewilder a fairy godmother. Secretly dating her bad boy boss, running wedding errands for her ungrateful sisters, and defending herself from the park’s resident villain means Jaine needs lots more than a comfy pair of shoes to restore order in her kingdom. First in the Storybook Valley series, a blend of sweet romance, chick lit, and fairy tale fun. 

“Get your Cotton Candy! A token a fluff!” the man in the red-and-white-striped suit yells, though he doesn’t need to raise his voice as he walks the fairway; the Ladies and Gentlemen flock to him wherever he is. His completion is the midget peddling popcorn, and his brother, Six of Poles, who sells roasted peanuts. Of course, he sells more Cotton Candy than the combination of both his rivals.

Cotton Candy, after all, is the food of the gods. In World Circus you can live your entire life eating nothing else. Though your tastes may change for a moment, craving the saltiness of fresh popped corn, or the earthy meat of the peanut, you will always return to the main staple.

During periods of being “flipped”, the stomach won’t grant the sweet floss access to touch its lining, allowing only raw flesh from a fellow member of World Circus inside. Then with the blink of an eye, the condition rights itself, and the patron craves nothing else but Cotton Candy.

The children who come to the Circus, swarm around him, jumping and reaching for the delectable treat. Gripping the white, paper cone, their faces disappear behind the bright pink or blue fluff, before they giddily scatter inside World Tent to watch the show.

Taste Will Tell
by Audrey Kalman

I’ve always loved both writing and cooking. In fact, I once wrote and published a cookbook. That was back in the days when “self-publishing” meant photocopying and comb binding the pages.

The combination of books and food—or literature and gustatory experiences, if you want to be fancy about it—is a natural one, and food seems to work its way into my writing often. A scene from my novel Dance of Souls brings two characters together for a home-cooked meal:

Roxanna had cooked him pollo mole—her mother’s recipe, with nothing from a jar or can. She had toasted and ground the nuts herself and softened the fruit (although she had used the blender and not the metate her mother would have used), hoping to demonstrate to Mr. Candine that in some dishes, albeit not in the case of coffee, ample emotion could compensate for a less-than-scientific approach. He had even helped her in the kitchen as they drank Corona straight from the bottle—another concession by Mr. Candine to his steadily slipping standards. Indeed, the dish had been a great success and they had both eaten more than was strictly good for them.

You could hardly find two more mismatched lovers; their attitudes toward food reveal their differences. Roxanna, the daughter of Guatemalan immigrants, is searching for her place in suburban California and has latched onto a fundamentalist church as a way to stay connected to her past. Cooking is part of her heritage and childhood, something she does as naturally as breathing.

Mr. Candine is a displaced mid-westerner, a religious fanatic with delusions of grandeur and some very peculiar ideas about the world. He also teaches middle-school science. His fussy precision—really just a way for him to maintain the illusion of control—makes itself evident when he cooks and eats. (The mention of coffee is a reference to the scientific exactitude he brings to the task of brewing his morning joe.)  It’s a great testament to Roxanna’s feminine wiles that she has gotten him to loosen up enough to drink beer while helping her cook, and straight from the bottle, no less!

How a character relates to food, cooking, and eating reveals a great deal about who they are and their motivations. I wonder what it reveals about authors…








Audrey has been writing since she was old enough to hold a pen and has been editing professionally for more than twenty-five years. Her novel What Remains Unsaid is scheduled for publication in 2016 by Sand Hill Review Press. Her previous novel, Dance of Souls, appeared in 2011. Many online and print journals have published her short fiction and poetry. She lives in northern California with her husband, two sons, and two cats, and is at work on another novel. 

In book 1 (Ravenswynd Legends) Elizabeth believes she’s just met the man of her dreams. Before she can get to really know him, she receives an invitation to a clandestine party – where legend has it – is hosted by vampires. The invitation promises a good time, good food and drink, and the choice to become “one of them”. She, her twin sister Melinda, and best friend Fiona, decide to attend, and as you can imagine - their lives will never be the same. Vampires also have an appetite for changing things…

Champagne flows freely. Platters of sizzling hot fillet mignon, (grilled to perfection, juicy and rare) are served, along with baked potatoes, baskets of hot, buttery bread, salads, and chocolate fudge cake. Everyone’s having fun…at first.

But the evening grows ominous, and chances are, they may never get home; Melinda is getting drunk, Fiona's gone missing, and a nightmarish clown is stalking Elizabeth. But even more terrifying - this sinister vampire thirsts for much more than what's flowing through her veins…

Book 2, Ravenswynd Dreams, opens with a romantic and mouthwatering honeymoon.

Upon entering the suite, Elizabeth notices the sweet scent of fresh fruit: grapes, strawberries, cherries and mangoes, apples and bananas. Also, a gift-basket containing a bottle of champagne with a variety of crackers, sharp cheese, smoky sausages, and dark chocolates. (For needed nourishment…later on.)

Several scrumptious meals will be consumed. On a night out on the town they enjoy jellied ham hock, a glazed leek and mushroom tart, and for the main course - rack of lamb with a crispy herb crust, Boulangère potatoes, and butternut squash. They drink a fine bottle of Chablis, and for dessert - hot fudge sundaes smothered in rich chocolate and warm toffee. The honeymooners will also feast on a delectable lunch that includes savory lobster for two, a bottle of red wine, and five-layer chocolate cream pie for dessert. I don’t know about you, but my mouth is watering now.

I bet you didn’t know that vampires love chocolate. After moving to the UK and meeting the rest of the vampire society at Ravenswynd, Elizabeth is pleased to learn this fact. She often finds the cook whipping up batches of chocolate mousse or Tiramisu cheesecake for dessert. She also discovers a little known secret: immortality isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Her dreams become real-life nightmares, and she finds herself up to her neck in a mind-bending abduction…

In book 3, Ravenswynd Visions, an enchanting trip to the Hebrides brings magnificent sights, and more luscious foods. Not only is the lodge’s fridge stocked with a basket of plump strawberries, Hebridean handmade chocolates and a bottle of fine Italian wine, Elizabeth is surprised to find that their violet-eyed prophetess, Sibelle can cook. She serves fresh fruits, bacon and eggs, grilled tomato, toast and marmalade, with cups of steaming hot English tea. On the side - tall glasses of Ambrosia - a most delicious donor, of course.

She also serves them a disturbing prophecy in the form of a rhyming riddle. This fills Elizabeth with a dreadful sense of foreboding; she knows that Sibelle is never wrong. And sometimes evil returns when you least expect it…

In book 4, Ravenswynd Destinies, a tasty breakfast includes fresh fruit-stuffed cantaloupe: each half filled with oranges, apples, peaches, blueberries, and strawberries, topped with honey- yogurt dressing, and on the side - scoops of fluffy scrambled eggs and ham.

At an elegant restaurant, Lizzy orders pan-fried Gressingham duck breast with star anise and blood-orange sauce – (It’s a real thing!) This comes with potatoes Dauphinoise and chef’s vegetables. Her husband orders the Prime Scottish sirloin steak (so melt-in-your-mouth divine, that Lizzy wishes she’d ordered it as well.)

Alas, there is more to our story than food. A forbidden trip to the U.S. enrages a clandestine ring of Vampire Hunters, putting everyone in danger. There’s another mystifying prophesy. Heart-twisting and astonishing revelations will change everything…

It is Iqbal who crushes those pretend dreams as well as the children’s hopes that their debts will indeed someday be erased. But he replaces those fantasies with a real hope – that one day they will run away from the factory. A dream that Iqbal swears he will bring to fruition. And that may actually sustain them far better than that forgotten sweet laddu.

Scots and food are inextricably linked. Long cold winters mean that hot, high calorie food is enjoyed with relish. Scotch broth thick with barley and brimming with vegetables, and stews made with the best Scotch beef are staple fare. Fodd that warms 'the cockles of your heart', or 'sticks to your ribs' as my grandmother would often say.




Italian immigrants brought fish and chips to Scotland and so began a love affair with all things deep-fried. Fish, dipped in batter and then fried to golden perfection, is served with fat succulent chips. Scotch pehs are also a much loved delicacy. Peh is the local Dundee word for pie. This is short cut pastry filled with spicy minced beef and dripping with grease. The pastry crumbles in your mouth and mixes with the mince causing a flavour akin to ambrosia.



The Detective Inspector Shona McKenzie Mysteries are set in Dundee. Shona and her team work long hours and the food they eat to fuel them is integrated throughout the books. In fact they eat a lot. Bacon rolls feature regularly with huge Scottish morning rolls filled with several thick rashers of bacon. Tattie Scones are another Scottish breakfast delicacy particularly enjoyed by Sergeant Peter Johnston. These are flat, made from potato and, you've got it, fried.

Dundee has had a long relationship with India due to the jute that came in to the ports. Therefore Indian curry is widely available. Shona's favourite food is anything from an Indian takeaway therefore she often orders it in for the team to enjoy.

Some of the best cakes in Scotland are made in Rough and Frasers bakery in Dundee, as are the pehs. Therefore, Shona often nips in to buy cakes for the team. They say an Army marches on its stomach; well, so do the police. They do in my books anyway.








Wendy H. Jones lives in Scotland, and her police procedural series featuring Detective Inspector Shona McKenzie, is set in the beautiful city of Dundee, Scotland. Wendy has led a varied and adventurous life. Her love for adventure led to her joining the Royal Navy to undertake nurse training. After six years in the Navy she joined the Army where she served as an Officer for a further 17 years. This took her all over the world including Europe, the Middle East and the Far East. Much of her spare time is now spent travelling around the UK, and lands much further afield. As well as nursing Wendy also worked for many years in Academia. This led to publication in academic textbooks and journals. Killer's Cut is the fourth book in the Shona McKenzie Mystery series.

Realtor and occasional amateur sleuth Regan McHenry keeps chocolate chip cookie dough in her freezer ready to take and bake at open houses to create a homey feel. It’s an old Realtor trick, well, that and putting a drop of vanilla on an electric burner to accomplish the same aromatic lure.

So it’s natural that she would bring chocolate-laced melty comforting cookies to the wrongly accused in their jail cells or to use food to gather clues. When she doesn’t have quid-pro-quoi information to exchange with her policeman-friend Dave, she’s been known to loosen his lips with scones. (And he’s been known to cause a dinner disaster with a well-timed call and tidbit of information that makes her forget to stir her risotto.)

But in the latest Regan McHenry Real Estate Mystery, A Neighborly Killing, due out this month, Regan uses a full dinner as a culinary carrot to catch her crook, a recent émigré from Columbia:

Hector Gonzalez was due for dinner at 6:00 on Thursday. Regan was still going to play bad cop to Tom’s good cop, appropriate especially since she knew Hector was woman averse. She was going to come across as the perfect hostess, though, and had researched traditional Colombian meals. Potato-filled empanadas, tidy little fold-over pastries that took forever to prepare, were on her list for hors d'oeuvres . The rest of the meal was a traditional Colombian banadeja paisa, a platter laden with red beans cooked with pork, white rice, ground meat, eggs, chicharrón, plantain, chorizo sausages, corn pancakes called arepa, avocado, and lemon. The great commonality all the food except the rice, avocado, and lemon had was that it was fried. Authenticity set off the smoke alarm in the kitchen twice as Regan perspired over her creations.

Her plan would have worked, too, if during the after dinner conversation she and her husband hadn’t overplayed their hand by suggesting to Hector, a self-styled “Highly Sensitive Person,” that there were spirits of the dead nearby and scaring him so badly he fled before incriminating himself. Oh well. At least their failure wasn’t because of her cuisine.

NO FOOLIN' ;) I'm thrilled to celebrate another year of delicious reads!

This year I dug into: 

Become Your Own Matchmaker – Patti Stanger
Lailah – Nikki Kelly
I Am Number Four – Pittacus Lore
The Royal Diaries - Elizabeth I – Kathryn Lasky
Queen Sugar – Natalie Baszile
Dakota – Gwen Florio
ZOO – James Patterson & Michael Ledwidge
Going Over – Beth Kephart

These fabulous authors also stopped by to share their food for thought:

Leyla Kader Dahm – Annabeth Neverending
Carmen DeSousa – Creatus
John Dolan – A Poison Tree
Gary Dolman – The Eighth Circle of Hell
Lorna Dounaeva – May Queen Killers
Dorothy Dreyer – My Sister's Reaper
E.J. Fechenda – The Beautiful People
Karl Fields – Steths: Cognition
Christoph Fischer – In Search of a Revolution
Ashley Fontainne – Growl
Fayette Fox – The Deception Artist
Rhiannon Frater – Fighting to Survive
Chris Galford – As Feathers Fall
Mark David Gerson – The MoonQuest
Katherine Gilraine – Revival IV (The Index Series)
Mark Gilroy – Cold as Ice
Kim Golden – Snowbound
Peter Golden – Wherever There is Light
Alisse Goldenberg – Bath Salts
Amelia Gormley – Strain
Staci Greason – The Last Great American Housewife
R.S. Guthrie – Honor Land
Jessica Haight & Stephanie Robinson – The Secret Files of Fairday Morrow
Dianne Harman – Murder at the Cooking School
Milda Harris – Adventures in Funeral Crashing
Kelly Hashway – The Monster Within
Tamar Hela – The Wrong Fairy Tale
Guido Henkel – Hunted
Laura Hile – Mercy's Embrace
Kim Hornsby – The Dream Jumper's Secret
Axel Howerton – Hot Sinatra
Lynn Hubbard – Return to Love
Sandra Hunter – Elanraigh
Mona Ingram – Forever Changed
Elizabeth Isaacs – The Light of Asteria
Vickie Johnstone – The Sea Inside
Richard Rhys Jones – Sisterhood of the Serpent
Sanela Jurich – Remember Me
Luke Murphy – Kiss & Tell
Michelle Zaffino – The Love Quad




With so many great guests this year, I didn’t get to blog about every book I read. And, to be fair, not every read lends itself to a good FoodFic discussion, either because the food in the story doesn't jump out at me, or my schedule’s already full for the year, or a book’s subject matter is too dark or serious for me to lightly chat about here.
Anyway, below are most (I’m sure I’ve forgotten a few) of the books I read over the past year that weren’t reviewed here at BWATE?

And, as always, please feel free to suggest some great reads for me in the coming year. :)
Karin Slaughter – Pretty Girls

NO FOOLIN' ;) I'm thrilled to celebrate another year of delicious reads!

This year I dug into: 

Become Your Own Matchmaker – Patti Stanger
Lailah – Nikki Kelly
I Am Number Four – Pittacus Lore
The Royal Diaries - Elizabeth I – Kathryn Lasky
Queen Sugar – Natalie Baszile
Dakota – Gwen Florio
ZOO – James Patterson & Michael Ledwidge
Going Over – Beth Kephart

These fabulous authors also stopped by to share their food for thought:

Leyla Kader Dahm – Annabeth Neverending
Carmen DeSousa – Creatus
John Dolan – A Poison Tree
Gary Dolman – The Eighth Circle of Hell
Lorna Dounaeva – May Queen Killers
Dorothy Dreyer – My Sister's Reaper
E.J. Fechenda – The Beautiful People
Karl Fields – Steths: Cognition
Christoph Fischer – In Search of a Revolution
Ashley Fontainne – Growl
Fayette Fox – The Deception Artist
Rhiannon Frater – Fighting to Survive
Chris Galford – As Feathers Fall
Mark David Gerson – The MoonQuest
Katherine Gilraine – Revival IV (The Index Series)
Mark Gilroy – Cold as Ice
Kim Golden – Snowbound
Peter Golden – Wherever There is Light
Alisse Goldenberg – Bath Salts
Amelia Gormley – Strain
Staci Greason – The Last Great American Housewife
R.S. Guthrie – Honor Land
Jessica Haight & Stephanie Robinson – The Secret Files of Fairday Morrow
Dianne Harman – Murder at the Cooking School
Milda Harris – Adventures in Funeral Crashing
Kelly Hashway – The Monster Within
Tamar Hela – The Wrong Fairy Tale
Guido Henkel – Hunted
Laura Hile – Mercy's Embrace
Kim Hornsby – The Dream Jumper's Secret
Axel Howerton – Hot Sinatra
Lynn Hubbard – Return to Love
Sandra Hunter – Elanraigh
Mona Ingram – Forever Changed
Elizabeth Isaacs – The Light of Asteria
Vickie Johnstone – The Sea Inside
Richard Rhys Jones – Sisterhood of the Serpent
Sanela Jurich – Remember Me
Luke Murphy – Kiss & Tell
Michelle Zaffino – The Love Quad




With so many great guests this year, I didn’t get to blog about every book I read. And, to be fair, not every read lends itself to a good FoodFic discussion, either because the food in the story doesn't jump out at me, or my schedule’s already full for the year, or a book’s subject matter is too dark or serious for me to lightly chat about here.
Anyway, below are most (I’m sure I’ve forgotten a few) of the books I read over the past year that weren’t reviewed here at BWATE?

And, as always, please feel free to suggest some great reads for me in the coming year. :)
Karin Slaughter – Pretty Girls

Ah, yes. A new year means new resolutions (or goals, amibitions, false promises - whatever you choose to call them).

I have all the standard personal betterment aims: more time with family, exercise, sleep, veggies...you get the idea. Heck, it's your idea, too!

I also make all the usual writer pledges: I will finish one (at least!) of my pending manuscripts, launch it to the literary masses and sell a gazillion copies, etc., etc., etc.

But, as readers, I'm sure you're really only interested in my TBR list for 2016. In the spirit of full disclosure-ship, I admit that I do not believe I will summit this mountain of text. However, if I can manage to carve out even a third of the great book behemoth, I am planting a flag in my front yard. Or perhaps my back yard, right by the spot where a new hammock should go to help me devour more delicious reads in 2017. ;)

Here's the list I've put together in the past 10 minutes:

Jeremy Bates - White Lies
Robin Benway - Emmy & Oliver
Carin Berger - The Little Yellow Leaf
Kate Jarvik Birch - Perfected
Cynthia Blair - The Banana Split Affair
Kiera Cass - The Heir
Sandra Cisneros - The House on Mango Street
Lisa Colozza Cocca - Providence
James Dashner - The Journal of Curious Letters
Richard P. Denney - A Girl's Guide to Falling in Love with a Zombie
Rachel DeWoskin - Blind
Anita Diamant - The Red Tent
Anthony Doerr - All the Light We Cannot See
Kathleen Duey - Sacred Scars
Alexandra Duncan - Salvage
Kate Forsyth - Bitter Greens
E.R. Frank - Dime
Neil Gaiman - The Graveyard Book
Ben Goldacre - Bad Science
S.A. Harazin - Painless
Charlaine Harris - Dead Until Dark
E.K. Johnston - A Thousand Nights
Mindy Kaling - Why Not Me?
Clinton Kelly - Oh No She Didn't
Jessi Kirby - Things We Know By Heart
Darragh McKeon - All That Is Solid Melts Into Air
Richelle Mead - Soundless
Susan Meissner - Secrets of a Charmed Life
Faye Meredith - Becoming Edward
Stephenie Meyer - Life and Death
Christiana Miller - Somebody Tell Aunt Millie She's Dead
Emma Mills - First & Then
Beth Moore - The Law of Love
Paula Morris - Ruined
Mike Resnick - Witch Fantastic
Celia Rivenbark - You Can't Drink All Day If You Don't Start in the Morning
Donald Rumsfeld - Known and Unknown
Sarah Elizabeth Schantz - Fig
Robin Schneider - Extraordinary Means
Ben Sherwood - The Survivors Club
Jackie Lea Sommers - Truest
Joann Sowles - Laney
James M. Tabor - Frozen Solid
Sabaa Tahir - An Ember in the Ashes
Suzanne Weyn - The Bar Code Tattoo
Nicola Yoon - Everything, Everything