Liner Notes for The Conspiracy Of The Dinner Invitation
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These are not real restaurants, but they are all real dishes, though in some case (the pork sharing platter in particular) slightly jazzed up to make them more entertaining. The three-layer cheesecake has had the details change to protect those involved.
All of the elements commented on, the bouche amuse, tasters, odd serving dishes, they’re all fine as far as I’m concerned. The rich pageantry of dining out. I don’t think stew in a pint glass is something I’ve actually seen, but I’m sure some enterprising restauranteur is planning it if they haven’t served it already. It does annoy some people. And that’s fine too. It’s these kinds of differences that make this country great.
This story has a formal, repetitive structure. The three dinners with three recurring characters from other stories advances and puts into play a few ideas for the rest of the series. Hopefully each conversation and menu is of interest as well. The whole things ties together with a mystery, in this case the question being why is Lacey going out to eat?
It’s also my attempt at making a boring crime more interesting. Who is stealing trade secrets and selling them to competitors? Lacey probably spends more time on this sort of thing than on spectacular crimes, or she does if she wants to make any money.
This is, of course, part of my self-imposed brief – to explore different styles of story. It’s probably more a sit-com idea, something they throw out when they’ve run through their initial set of good ideas for the situation and characters. “What if we have an episode where they’re all in a restaurant?”
I suppose the question here is, have I run out of ideas already or is this just playful experimentation? Well, I would answer, why not both?
...crimes need to be solved. Even if that’s impossible, because once someone’s broken the trust, done the harm you can’t put it back together as it was before. That’s a loosely re-cast idea I had while lying in an MRI machine, trying to ignore the discomfort and noise. I planned out a character who would say this, that crimes can’t be solved and yet they have to solve, or uncover them anyway. And then the plot would iterate on that idea.
I got halfway through writing that before deciding it didn’t work. But like a restaurant kitchen, bits that might normally be discarded can become the dish of the day further down the line. Or cooked down for stock. And appear on your plate, unexpectedly.
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