It has been said that the elaborate and rich descriptions you use to create your worlds and characters bring your stories to life. Where do your descriptions come from? Are any of your characters based on real people?
The descriptions come from years of reading history, sociology, cultural anthropology, almost anything I can put my hands on in any and every subject that caught my eye. Including religion and mythology, of course, necessities for a fantasy writer, though I went at them first simply because I wanted to. It all tumbles together in my head, and out comes what I write. I don’t try to copy cultures or times, only to make cultures that are believable. I can’t explain it any better than that.
I don’t base characters on real people. With one exception, at least. Every major female character and some of the minor have at least a touch of my wife, Harriet. I won’t tell her which bits in which women, though. After all, what if she didn’t like it? She knows where I sleep.
If you are viewing this on github.io, you can see that this site is open source. Please do not try to improve this page. It is auto-generated by a python script. If you have suggestions for improvements, please start a discussion on the github repo or the Discord.