With a historical setting, I worry about accuracy at every turn... With a created world, I have to worry about all of it holding together and seeming coherent... Each presents unique challenges and opportunities.

Guy Kay is probably my favorite and the writer I most want to emulate.

In teaching writing, I'm learning new things about writing.

Writing about craft has forced me to think more about my own writing technique, and to break down my process in ways that have been enormously helpful to me.

The best writing advice I ever got was "Keep moving forward, don't retreat into rewrites." The worst came from a book that said "Writing fiction is like telling lies," which just seems stupid to me.

The closer you can get to your setting and to primary sources, the more authentic your history is going to be.

As I write, invariably I encounter more questions and answer those as I go.