Cooking for Cannibals received a 4+ star review, making it an IndieReader Approved title.
Following find an interview with author Rich Leder.
What is the name of the book and when was it published?
Cooking for Cannibals. The release date was 1/14/21.
What’s the book’s first line?
It was an unprecedented feat of pharmaceutical engineering with a kiss from Mother Nature and a whisper from God.
What’s the book about? Give us the “pitch”.
I will respectfully defer to the blurb on the book’s back cover:
Fountain of youth? More like murderous medication!
Carrie Kromer pushes the boundaries of science, not her social life. The brilliant behavioral gerontologist’s idea of a good time is hanging out with her beloved lab rats and taking care of her elderly mother and the other eccentric old folks at the nursing home. So no one is more surprised than Carrie when she steals the lab’s top-secret, experimental medicine for aging in reverse.
Two-time ex-con Johnny Fairfax dreams of culinary greatness. But when his corrupt parole officer tries to drag him from the nursing home kitchen, the suddenly young-again residents spring to his defense and murder the guy—and then request Johnny cook them an evidence-devouring dinner to satisfy their insatiable side-effect appetite.
As their unexpected mutual attraction gets hot, Carrie and Johnny find themselves caught up with the authorities who arrive to investigate the killing. But even more dangerous than the man-eating not-so-senior citizens could be the arrival of death-dealing pharmaceutical hitmen.
Can Carrie and Johnny find true love in all this bloody madness?
Cooking for Cannibals is a dark comic thriller with a heaping helping of romance. If you like fast-paced plots, unconventional characters, and humor that crosses the line, then you’ll have a feast with Rich Leder’s wild ride.
What inspired you to write the book? A particular person? An event?
Like most of my crazed story ideas, I have no real sense of where the inspiration came from to write an wild, dark, and outrageous thriller with cannibalism as the side effect of the Fountain of Youth drug. It’s not like I wake up thinking about cannibalism. It’s not like I know anyone who wakes up thinking about cannibalism. I don’t personally know any cannibals. I don’t know anyone who knows any cannibals. I don’t know anyone who knows anyone who knows anyone who knows any cannibals. I imagine I thought it might make for an insane ride. And I was right about that. But like so many other things in my life, I don’t know why. I have a thing for dark humor. Maybe that’s it. Not too many things darker than cannibalism. That’s about as out-there as dark humor gets. But in the right context and written with laughing in mind at all times, lots of dark stuff can be funny—even this.
As for inspiration in general, all I can say is strange shit is always running like a movie in my mind. Why? Where does it come from? I don’t know. Tiny little droplets of ideas germinating in my head for years suddenly appear before my eyes and announce that they are ready to become a fun and funny ride. I have a thing for wild dark humor. Maybe that’s it. Not too many things wilder than an honest-to-God Fountain of Youth drug stolen from an illegal lab. Not too many things darker than cannibalism. That’s about as out-there as dark humor gets. But in the right context and written with laughing in mind at all times, lots of dark stuff can be funny—just like this.
What’s the main reason someone should really read this book?
This has been about the worst year in everybody’s life, at least everybody I know and read about. Certainly among the most challenging and probably the least funny. Cooking for Cannibals will give the reader a chance to laugh out loud at some dark humor, an opportunity none of us really have right now. It’s fast and fun and funny. Easy to read. Just a great ride in a time where a great ride fits the bill.
What’s the most distinctive thing about the main character? Who-real or fictional-would you say the character reminds you of?
There are two main characters in Cooking for Cannibals, Carrie Kromer and Johnny Fairfax. Each has a distinctive characteristic. Carrie is a brilliant behavioral gerontologist who has lived a quiet, sheltered life, often preferring her lab rats to people. No relationships, no fun, a wallflower uninterested in living out in the sunshine. Johnny is a two-time ex-con biker butcher who sees himself as a rock star chef. Crude. Rough as shit around his rough edges. No education to speak of other than the street and prison. These two fall in love. What fun to be a part of their journey!
When did you first decide to become an author?
As far as becoming a writer, I believe I’ve always been one. When I was boy playing in dirt with plastic soldiers and Tonka Toy tanks, my army men had backstories. Friends at home. Dogs. Hobbies. Favorite foods. They’d read each other letters from their wives and girlfriends. Who does that when they’re six years old? Writers, that’s who. I wrote skits and directed neighborhood kids in them for other neighborhood kids and their parents when I was nine. We performed in a garage down the street. The garage door was the curtain. I wrote a play in high school. But when I went to college, it finally dawned on me that people were writing the movies I was watching. How could I not have known that all along? No matter, now that I knew it, that was that. I was going to live my life as a writer.
So I spent a full decade in New York City after college, working in restaurants, studying screenwriting at The New School, and playing in rock bands. Then we moved to Los Angeles, where I got lucky and worked as a screenwriter for close to 15 years. That fabulous time was followed by 20 years in North Carolina writing movies and novels. A reasonable run for a writer, overall. I’m still running.
So, I don’t know when I first decided to become an author. Somewhere in there. But, like I said, I think I was born that way.
Is this the first book you’ve written?
Cooking for Cannibals is my sixth novel. I’m three quarters of the way through Gottiguard, the fourth and final Kate McCall Crime Caper, a hilarious murder mystery series set in New York City. Kate is a way-off Broadway musical actor who inherits her father’s PI business after he’s found brutally murdered in an insurance company elevator. In each book, she solves her new case while she tracks her father’s killer. She uses the eccentrics in the brownstone she lives in and manages and the melodramatic members of her histrionic acting troupe to help her with her cases—like a crazy kind of Mission Impossible. They’re funny books, yes, but they’re also rocking good mysteries. You won’t know whodunnit until the very end.
So if you’re counting, that will be novel #7. After that, I have four standalones waiting in the wings wondering what in the world the delay is, why aren’t I writing them yet. I do so love dark comic thrillers, so I’ve got three of those. And one magical romantic comedy.
How much time do you generally spend on your writing?
Most days, I get up reasonably early and swim laps at the local YMCA. That’s my routine for the last 17 years or so. I suppose that makes me a swimmer. Then I come home and walk two miles. So I’m a walker too. I don’t usually sit down to write until after lunch. I’m not good as a sentient human being if I haven’t exercised. So that’s first. I’m thinking about my plot lines and character arcs all morning, but I’m not writing yet. Just working through that day’s scene in my head and heart. I might record some thoughts on my phone when I’m walking, but mostly I’m thinking it through. Then I do a solid four or five hours of arranging words into sentences that (hopefully) produce the desired emotional reactions I want the reader to feel, which means I have to feel it first. It’s a deep dive into everything that makes my characters living, breathing, three-dimensional people, so I’m usually too whipped to do more than five hours. I can tell the quality of my writing, the depth to which I’m able think and feel words and moments is turning to mush. So I stop. I never beat myself up about it. When I’m done, I’m done. Whatever I finished that day is good news. Nights are spent with my wife, the awesome Lulu. Friends too, when we’re not in the midst of a global plague. Phone calls to our children, dinner, movies, reading, bourbon or tequila. Those are my days and nights in a nutshell.
Would you go traditional if a publisher came calling? If so, why?
For my print books, yes. It is my intention to one day seek a traditional publisher for my print books only. I intend to retain the rights to my ebooks and audiobooks, which I will market and sell from my own digital store—in addition to maintaining a presence with all the large digital booksellers. Writers in charge of their own online stores is the future. My future, anyway.
Is there something in particular that motivates you (fame? fortune?)
Nothing wrong with a little fame and fortune. I dream about them probably as much as the next person. But if that’s what motivates you, there are easier and faster ways of grabbing those particular gold rings than being a writer. I remain motivated by my love of sentences. I love a great sentence. I sit down every afternoon and hope I write some. If you write enough of them and then arrange them a certain way, they bring forth the story you’ve been holding in your head and heart. It’s a kind of magic. I still love it.