Writing Hell’s Kitchen Critic taught me that humor alone isn’t enough. The jokes might carry a scene, but it’s the underlying emotional scaffolding—the character arcs, the decisions, the resistance to returning to who they were—that make the story feel earned. I didn’t set out to write a redemption story. I set out to write something fun, irreverent, fast-paced. But somewhere between soufflés and summoning circles, it became something more: a story about someone who found a new purpose in a place he was never meant to belong.

The greatest challenge was tone. There’s a tightrope act in stories like this—balancing chaos with sincerity, absurdism with consequence. It would’ve been easy to let Belzagor tip too far into caricature. But the funnier he became, the more I needed him to want something. Not power. Not absolution. Just good food. The purity of that desire is, strangely, what humanizes him most. He doesn’t change who he is—but he chooses to stay in a world that confuses, delights, and infuriates him. That felt real.

Another surprise was the pacing. This isn’t a traditional three-act structure. It unfolds like a tasting menu—scene after scene of escalating flavors and magical set pieces. Yet each course had to build on the last. The first magical incident (the flaming soufflé) had to feel just silly enough. By the time we’re defeating infernal management with mousse and mojitos, it needed to feel inevitable, not random. That meant grounding each escalation in something emotionally true—even if that truth was as simple as “Marcel just wants to pass his finals.”

And finally, I learned not to flinch from whimsy. It’s easy to second-guess the weirdness. To wonder if demons weeping into purée are too much. But when the world commits to its own absurd rules—and when characters respond to the ridiculous with emotional sincerity—the result can be unexpectedly powerful.

Writing Challenge

Write a story where a character attempts to sabotage something banal (a PTA meeting, a home inspection, a wedding rehearsal) using over-the-top supernatural means. The more unnecessary the magic, the funnier the result. Bonus points if the sabotage accidentally makes things better.

Questions for Reflection

What would you choose if you were no longer beholden to the job that defined you?

When does criticism stop being constructive and become cruelty?

And what small pleasures—mundane and magical alike—are worth rebelling for?