FOODFIC: Please Welcome Jane Ward, Author of In the Aftermath

My maternal grandmother immigrated to the United States from Edinburgh and worked for years as a baker in the Boston University dining halls. When summer arrived, she would leave her husband and three daughters behind and pick up seasonal baking work in vacation resorts on Cape Cod. 

During my childhood, when her career baking days were behind her, Nana often visited our family, and at the drop of a hat would whip up a batch of what she called “girdle scones,” a quick bread that has nothing to do with foundation garments and everything to do with being cooked on a hot pan—a girdle, in Scots English—on top of the stove.

Years later, confident in the baking skills I learned from watching her, I followed in her footsteps and took a job as weekend baker at a neighborhood bakery. My day would begin at 2 a.m. with baking muffins and scones, and end between 10 and 11 after I pulled my beloved loaves of challah and white sandwich bread out of the ovens. It was a physical job that put my sleep schedule at odds with weekend family time. But I loved that job; I loved watching happy people head home with the delicious pastry I had made. 

In the Aftermath opens in April 2008, just as the Great Recession is about to do its worst to many homeowners and small business owners. These are the people whose stories I would tell. As I brainstormed small business settings for David and Jules, the husband and wife at the center of the novel, I began picturing them moving around a bakery similar to the one I had worked at years before. Yes, it was an environment I could write about with authority, but my decision was about more than choosing something familiar. I write to explore the nature of human connections, and the origin story of bread is also one of community.

Before the first brave souls looked at wild, grassy wheat and came up with the idea of grinding it into flour, turning that flour into dough with water and airborne yeasts, shaping this concoction into a cake, and then sticking it into fire, people roamed—rootless—and foraged to live. 

Once bread caught on as a reliably available food source, people were able to stop moving to find nourishment. They became farmers, bakers, consumers; they settled close to each other. Communities grew and people thrived. Around bread. Because of bread. 

In Jules and David’s fictional bakery community all those eons later, customers would have eaten good, crusty bread and everything else that owes its existence to society’s first humble loaf: scones and muffins, danish and croissants, cookies and brownies and cakes. In their best times, these bakers touched lives—sending sustaining food into people’s homes and bringing them joy. It is this same longing for connection - through work, through relationships – that guides the characters in In the Aftermath as they move through difficult times into a brighter future.

Thanks for stopping by to share your food for thought, Jane!

You can find Jane here:

JaneAWard.com

Twitter @AuthorJane

Facebook Fan Page

Books on Amazon

FOODFIC: Please Welcome Real Laplaine, Author of Deception People

Betrayed by Apple Pie

Deception People was inspired in the wake of 9/11, where literally hundreds of engineers and investigative professionals from around the world, people who had no bias or other agenda, objectively examined the attack, and concluded that the two planes did not, and could not possibly, under any circumstances, have brought down the Twin Towers with such precision. What they did discover was ample evidence showing that demolition style explosives had been secretly placed in the support columns of both buildings, and then carefully detonated to make it appear otherwise, bringing both structures down in their footprint, without touching another building; and moreover, that a 3rd building, 47 stories high, across the street, not even struck by a plane, also crumbled with perfect-demolition style, shortly thereafter, an incident which was explained away by the government, and yet, which few questioned or even challenged.

Deception People, while a thriller in of itself, presents a disturbing scenario, where another group of senior officials and their backers decide to repeat an act of terrorism, but this time, one that completely disrupts the nation through its digital platform – all of which seems relatively harmless until one realizes that airplanes will be crashing into one another or onto runways, financial systems will cease to operate, that tens of thousands will die in hospitals where equipment has failed, where transport services will cease thereby causing all manner of road and train collisions, and more.

One man discovers their plot and tries to expose it. Troy Evans, an unassuming graphic designer living in Minneapolis, has a special ability, one he has honed over the years. Surviving a near fatal accident as a young boy, Troy experienced his first out-of-body experience, and went on, over the years, to experience many, many, more. Now, as an adult, and still practicing his outings in secret, he happens across a hotel hundreds of miles away, and overhears a bizarre conversation where men are planning a massive terrorist attack on the nation.

Troy immediately reports the matter to Homeland Security, but soon finds himself under attack by the very people plotting the terrorism, people in high positions of government and the military-industrial establishment employed by the U.S. government, all of whom will benefit from the debacle.

Locked away as delusional and dangerous, Troy convinces his psychiatrist he is telling the truth, and together they run, trying to find someone who will listen, while evading a lethal team who are tracking them down, to silence them before they can speak up. At one point, they stop at the “Shack”, a diner in South Dakota, a seemingly safe haven where American apple pie could have been born, but unfortunately their presence there is soon discovered, and the net is tightened around them.

The question is, who will listen to what sounds like mere conspiracy theory coming from two fugitives on the run, and if anyone does, will it be in time to stop the attack?

While many choose to believe that 9/11 was entirely the work of Islamic radicals, Deception People presents another picture – those with an agenda, sociopaths who couldn’t care less if 3000 people, or 100,000 are killed, providing it aggrandizes their power and their bank accounts.

Thanks for stopping by to share your food for thought, Real!

You can find Real here:

RealLaplaine.com

Twitter @Real0Laplaine

Facebook Fan Page

Books on Amazon

FOODFIC: Please Welcome Lynn Lamb, Author of The Survivor Diaries

After living through a pandemic, there’s a good possibility you have considered what you would do if food supplies dried up or became otherwise unavailable. Having written the Survivor Diaries Series, five novels exploring how one group of neighbors survive a global nuclear war, these days I’ve been acutely aware of my emergency supplies, especially food and water.

Not surprisingly, that was the first thought for Laura Patton, the reluctant leader of a group dubbed the Villagers. With the possibility of being trapped in their home for three weeks after the initial bombs dropped, waiting for the nuclear clouds to dissipate, Laura had the forethought to collect drinking water in plastic eighteen gallon containers she had previously used as packing boxes. These water stores checked the first box of Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

With the most important life maintaining ration in place, food and nutritional requirements were next on the list. Preparing for at least two weeks of quarantine, with no access to Instacart or Grub Hub delivery, the survivors were tasked with creating a food bank following the catastrophic first days of the apocalypse.

It was time for me as an author to firmly lace up Laura’s shoes and dig into researching dietary needs, ways of preserving food stores, and preparing meals sans electricity and gas. It was most important to me that these techniques were real-life tested, so I went about doing so, video recording my “Survivor Challenge.” I spent one day learning how to box a fire starter kit, make candles, and even fashion a beer can stove for heating coffee and water for rehydrated foods. You can check out the results, sometimes frustrating and other times hysterical, here: http://www.lynnlamb.com/survivor-challenge.

After escaping death in the rolling turbulence and hot ashes of bombs and the collapse of unstable buildings, the characters were left to tend to their wounds, and then wait for the worst of the radioactive winds to die. As they did so, they worried about their food supplies once their rations became depleted.

The Villagers found ways to communicate through ham radios and walkie-talkies while interned, discussing what comes next. When finally liberated from their confinement, one of the first tasks was to come together to share food and water. The family’s matriarch, Annie, headed a cooking committee to determine what foods would be easiest to prepare in bulk. Dried goods such as rice and pasta were first on the list. Other characters were tasked with forging through the wreckage of the town to find the location of a big box store and rummage through what remained.

Thus were the first weeks of life after global nuclear war. As weeks, months, and eventually years passed, the needs and skills of the Villagers grew and morphed. Growing sustainable food sources, at first for themselves and later for trade and the health of the population as a whole, became a priority.

Learn more about the life and death challenges of the Villagers in the Survivor Diaries Series as this group of determined neighbors face monumental obstacles on the path to what really matters in life.

So, what would you be eating at the end of the world?

Thanks for stopping by to share your food for thought, Lynn!

You can find Lynn here:

LynnLamb.com

Twitter @LynnLambAuthor

Facebook Fan Page

Books on Amazon

Have you ever wondered how you would survive a global nuclear apocalypse? Lynn Lamb imagined it into existence on the written page. And thus began her award-winning and best-selling literary career.

Lynn Lamb is the author of the post-apocalyptic Survivor Diaries Series, Opus of the Dead Series, The Oxymoron of Still Life, a short story anthology, and Mechaniclism, an apocalyptic, horror novella. Lamb was inspired by the characters in her hometown of Monterey, California. She holds a BA in Cinematic Arts and Technology and has worked as a scriptwriter and corporate filmmaker.

The Survivor Diaries explosive series and the Opus of the Dead’s chilling novels have made a big bang and a scream on the literary scene. Grab her incredible titles, and don’t miss out on this chart-topping author!

*Excerpts from Monte Vista Village, all rights reserved