Zeus's 10th Daughter is a culinary romp about a creative chef, Paul, and unveils the underbelly of the culture of the kitchen. Chef Paul, in this fictional memoir, gives a vivid account of his beginnings as a dishwasher through becoming a line cook, sous chef, and ultimately his rise to chefdom. Paul tries to reconcile cooking with other art forms while studying under award-winning poets and reconciles the chef as an artist. Among a backdrop of idiosyncratic characters through Houston, Dallas, Los Angeles, Florida, Moscow, and southeast Asia, follow Paul on what really happens behind the view of the diners even in an open kitchen. Paul struggles for artistic culinary independence and encounters resistance from European chefs, hotel bureaucracies, human resource directors, waiters, owners, the press, general managers, culinary dogma, and clashes of egos involved in the creative process. Chef Paul sheds light on what really takes place behind the scenes of a chef-driven restaurant, even in an open kitchen, hidden from the view of the dining room. Paul, through his fictional memoir, reflects upon his career with the literary dark humor reminiscent of Hunter S. Thompson and Gunter Grass.
