I still recommend reading travel guides as an insight to a travellers perspective on fantasy worlds. Nearly all characters end up travelling at some point, and they have many of the same needs and concerns covered in travel guides.

Unquestioning obedience is for slaves, the uneducated and the pathetic.

How am I going to make friends with these people if all I can think of is how easy it would be to rob them?

Tayend nodded. “I know it won’t. I admit I was worried about you, but you are still your old self, underneath.” Dannyl straightened in protest. “Underneath what?” The Elyne stood up, waving one hand in Dannyl’s direction. “All…that.” “I’m reeling at your descriptive clarity,” Dannyl told him.

Nodding, Cery strode to the door and stepped through. Though the burly guards eyes him suspiciously, Cery smiled back. Never make enemies of someone's lackeys, his father had taught him. Better still, make them like you a lot.

Inspiration comes from so many sources. Music, other fiction, the non-fiction I read, TV shows, films, news reports, people I know, stories I hear, misheard words or lyrics, dreams

What was I thinking? Of all the assistants I could have wound up with, why did I have to choose the one with the scary mother and troublemaking in his bloodlines? I am doomed.