Rebecca Stead’s latest book, Liar & Spy, features an entertaining (and educational!) subplot about the sense of taste. Main character Georges’ science class participates in a taste-test experiment that Rebecca, while reminiscing with me for a Talks With Roger interview, remembers from her own school days:

Roger: Is that a real thing, that taste test?

Rebecca: Yes, I did that.

Roger: And what kind were you?

Rebecca: I was a non-taster. The myth from the book [of non-tasters being soul mates] didn’t come from real life. But I think maybe the reason I came up with that idea is that we all put these pieces of paper in our mouths, and everybody really did make all these retching noises and ran for the water fountain, and I was one of two people in the class who didn’t taste anything but, you know, paper. And the other person was a kid I had sort of a crush on.

Roger: Ooh.

Rebecca: And so at the time I thought, “What does it mean that Tomas and I don’t taste this?” As it turned out, it actually didn’t mean anything.

Roger: He’s not the father of your children, then?

Rebecca: No. Although, I think, had we had children, they would probably not have been able to taste that chemical either.

I also asked Rebecca about her favorite tastes. Here are the results:

Sweet: Caramel (preferably mail-ordered from a place in Montana)
Salty: Olives (any kind)
Bitter: Espresso
Sour: My father-in-law’s whiskey sours
Umami: Parmesan (by the hunk)

Then Rebecca turned the tables to find out mine:

Sweet: Spice drops
Salty: My homemade Chex mix
Bitter: Irish black tea
Sour: I put lemon on or in anything I can
Umami: Paprika

Anyone else want to share? And did anyone else do this taste test in school?

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Grace Lin will be signing her new novel Dumpling Days

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Simmons gal Susan Bloom made this delicious wedding cake for us, chocolate with praline frosting. YUM. While it is true that I am taller than Richard, I am represented by the little faux-Hummel guy in the bow tie (whose head fell off when we washed him; sorry Kitty) while the tall man is an Alias action figure of arch villain Arvin Sloane as played by Ron Rifkin, to whom Richard bears a startling resemblance.

Thank you Susan for the cake; Kitty for the faux-Hummel and all the Horn Bookers who made fruit salad, took pictures, danced, and held my hand.

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Oh yes, work: the writers’ conference afforded me (and the attendees, I hope) a great six-hour discussion with Mary Lee Donovan, Debbie Kovacs, Alison Morris, Nancy Werlin and Martin Sandler about contemporary children’s publishing, from the nitty-gritty of getting an agent to larger questions about the future of the market. Everybody seemed to think that we were not seeing enough picture books (the form, Mary Lee suggested, most likely to survive as printed book) and perhaps too much YA. Nancy wisely advised the audience to cover its ears when we moaned about the current depressing economic situation–since you need to write the book you need to write anyway, she said, discouraging words can only harm.

And I finally got to meet Mitali Perkins. Yup, she’s tall.

Now the Christmas books are calling–I have to go write a review of Jim Murphy’s forthcoming Truce, about the sadly ephemeral Christmas peace on the Western Front in 1914, for our Holiday Books feature. Ho-ho-ho.

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