Take what is offered and that must sometimes be enough.

Pretty much anything you care to imagine can happen in a fantasy, which in turn means you can really crank up the intensity of the tale you're telling.

The way I see it, anyone who's proud of their country is either a thug or just hasn't read enough history yet.

Good authors mature over time: it does take awhile. Travel abroad and learn to live in other cultures. That's one of the things about teaching abroad.

I think certainly if I'd started getting published when I was in my early twenties, I was quite sheltered then and didn't know anything much about the world. I hadn't had any direct experience of how the world works.

For me, any fiction of nobles and swords necessarily has to be a story of corruption, injustice and savagely violent conflict - because any other treatment is going to have all the heft and realistic honesty of a bedtime fairy tale for five year olds.

The human eye is a wonderful device. With a little effort, it can fail to see even the most glaring injustice.