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I have a preoccupation with food. I like to eat it. My characters like to eat it. I like to cook it, so my characters do, too. Unfortunately, World War II brought about the rationing of many things I like to eat-butter and sugar to name two. In spite of the cutbacks, FLYGIRL has food aplenty in the preparation of simple meals between mother and daughter. Ida Mae snaps the ends off the string beans; her mother washes mustard greens in the sink. Biscuits are baked (with margarine, not butter!) and when Ida's little brother, Abel, finagles some cream out of the neighbor, strawberry shortcakes enter the picture.

World War II brought about a lot of changes in the kitchen. SPAM, for one thing, became a staple in many households, and the invention of the frozen dinner followed on the heels of all those women leaving the kitchen to fly airplanes and work in factories. Rosie the Riveter is in many ways the mother (or, at least the grateful older sister) of Betty Crocker and Sara Lee. Even after the war, in the 1950s when women returned to the hearth and a nuclear family lifestyle was idealized, the concept of convenience in cooking swept the nation. The first microwave, invented in 1947 by Raytheon, relied on wartime technology according to their website. Sure, it was the size of a refrigerator, but by the mid-50s it was available in a home-sized model and thus unleashed thousands of women from the damnable fate of sweating over a hot stove all day.