Catering is extremely demanding financially and physically. It's a business.

In a mystery, the sleuth must be believably involved and emotionally invested in solving the crime.

I'm always astonished to see how badly people can behave when they think no one is noticing.

After I outlined 'Catering to Nobody,' I went and worked for a caterer. And the other thing I had to do was to talk to the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department about how they investigated a crime.

I wanted to be a literary writer, so I wrote story after story and sent them to 'The New Yorker.'

When I started to write culinary mysteries, I did it because nobody was doing it anymore.

One thing that improved my cooking skills was being a poor student in California... If you don't have much money, you have to learn to cook.