Let's Do Lunch! with Christopher Rice @ The Cecil

Author Christopher Rice joins host Robin Milling over lunch at The Cecil in Harlem to talk about his first supernatural novel, The Heavens Rise which is a page-turner featuring a 'Louisiana swamp mind-control parasite atmosphere.' Chris returns to New Orleans he says to give the community a kindness post Katrina. Compared to his first book A Density of Souls, where he trashed everyone he went to high school with, he is now paying homage to the people of the city and their desire to see it thrive.

Chris says that of all his novels The Heavens Rise is the most cinematic and he would want to be involved in writing the screen adaptation. He may come full circle as he originally moved to Los Angeles to write screenplays; surprising even himself by writing a book.

As the son of Anne Rice and his late father Stan who was a creative writing professor and poet, writing was inevitable. Chris reveals his father read him Tin Tin as a bedtime story while mom favored singing show tunes to lull him to sleep!

Lunch with Chris at The Cecil in Harlem, named for the former hotel, was prepared by Chef de cuisine J.J.  It's Afro Asian new American cuisine featured Oxtail dumplings, spicy crispy ginger squid, and crispy okra fries. He brought his influences from Ghana, steeping himself in African markets, and preparing meals alongside the locals. At The Cecil he adds green apples to curry, and perry perry sauce to prawns. Save room for dessert with their peanut opera; sponge cake layered with peanut butter and chocolate and flourless chocolate cake with beany seed brittle.

And watch for a second supernatural thriller from Christopher set on a plantation in the deep South.