Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} Lady of the Helm (Bloodline Trilogy #1) by T.O. Munro TOMunro. Of the last twenty books I have read, The Grey Bastards will be the fourth that I have been introduced to via Mark Lawrence's Self-Publishing Fantasy Blog Off. This is, I think a testament to the competition's success in lifting some very good books above the noise signal and anti- selfpublishing snobbery that has hidden some remarkable talents from a wider audience. The Grey Bastards came first in the 2016-17 contest and is an extremely well polished book - even if its protagonists are as rough as sandpaper toilet tissue. The story's feet appear planted in the Dungeons and Dragons milieu of my youth - huge birds called rokh and amorphous digesting blobs called black sludges could have sat quite happily between the pages of the Monster Manual. The Grey Bastards are themselves a troop (or rather a hoof) of hog riding half-orc cavalry who we see and bond with through our point of view protagonist - Jackal. Jackal himself, is young, ambitious and - if not exactly handsome - at least less intrinsically ugly than others of his kin. Make no mistake, this is a brilliant book, that challenges the reviewer only in knowing where to begin tackling the task of describing it, much as one might wonder how to bring down Jackal's brother in arms the mountainous and formidable thrice blood - Oats. Thrice bloods are one of French's many linguistic, cultural or even biological developments that add a deep and rich additional dimension to what - in other hands - might have been a mere parade through a flat role playing campaign. The half-orcs are all bastards, beget by orcish rapes - fierce and formidable fighters the various hoofs have become part of the Empire's defense against orcish incursions. Thrice bloods are the most formidable half-orcs, born of a half-orc mother and an orc father. The half orc hoofs - and other re-purposed denizens of familiar myth - each patrol their own parcel (or lot) of the near lawless borderlands between the orcs and the empire. The lots are a barren dangerous place - home only to those who have no other place to turn to - a wild land that makes the wild west look like a kindergarten's playground - where the only safety is in the mutual loyalty and reliance of belonging to a group. I daren't say too much more of the plot - this is a book to discover for yourselves. It is perhaps fair to warn you that - from the very outset - the tone and language of our half-orc hero and his friends is beyond bawdy, beyond coarse and yet all the more believable for it. These are the roughest of rough soldiers bound by the close knit camaraderie and carnal preoccupations of many a troop of specialist mercenaries operating under near constant duress. I have seen the like of their crude language previously only in Jeff Salyards' coarse-tongued Syldoon soldiers who rode through the Bloodsounder's arc trilogy. However, the fluent variety of the Grey Bastard's cursing might raise a blush even in Lieutenant Muldoos. However, the story is no testosterone driven male monopoly. The female characters - Fetching (the half-orc warrior), Beryl (sometime nursemaid, sometime director of the half-orc orphanage), Delia (the whore who dares) amongst several others are all given agency and screen-time aplenty and you come to love and fear for them as much - if not more so - than for Jackal himself. French's half-orcs are eloquently, entertainingly, crudely, witty, but his writing is also skillfully evocative in its descriptions. Some of the lines that caught my eye include ". there was a threat buried in the thick folds of politeness." "The morning sky was newborn, still jaundiced before a proper sunrise." ". the wet defeat in her eyes betrayed she did not know how to proceed." The action scenes are gripping, the technicalities of hog cavalry warfare absorbing, the pacing brilliant. I consumed the last 43% of this book in a single evening - breathlessly borne along through a sequence of ascending climaxes (of the plot variety). The various threads of the story wound round and through each other to an ending that was so beautifully perfectly fitting that I put down the kindle with a sense of utter satisfaction. This is a tale of the fellowship, of the loyalty that each individual must bear to the greater whole - and in the final analysis due recognition must be and is paid to the one willing to sacrifice everything for the others, TOMunro. Mark Lawrence recently challenged his facebook followers to give him a page number between 1 and 415 and he would try to find a spoiler free quote to share from that page of The Wheel of Osheim. There may have been those who hoped to tease the entire book from him in a giant literary jigsaw and so get a drop on its June 7th release date. For those who have not yet got their hands on an Advance Reading Copy - circle that date - (Think D-Day landings + 72 years and 1 day). The Wheel of Osheim is another feast of quality writing and high "quote per page" density. For me though, the quote that spoke to me most comes from page 343. "A story will lead a man through dark places. Stories have direction. A good story commands a man's thoughts along a path, allowing no opportunity to stray, no space for anything but the tale as it unfolds before you." There are times in our lives when we all need a story that good and The Wheel of Osheim is itself just such a story. I think I will struggle to rein in my review, for the book sets so many dominos toppling in different directions in my mind. The joy, as ever is in Lawrence's writing, his vivid imagery and his charmingly reprehensible characters cast mercilessly into a raging torrent of a plot. Jal's timeline is entwined in a braid with Jorg's, the two very different heroes inhabiting the same time and setting. Here, as in Prince of Fools, the stories bump briefly alongside each other, ships that pass, somewhat drunkenly, in the night and part - the one not entirely untouched by the other. However, even for those of us who followed Jorg all the way to the end of Emperor of Thorns, Lawrence still provides plenty of heart-in-the- mouth alarms and surprises as Jal skitters along at perilous heights and depths. Along the way, both Jal and the reader get some new perspectives on old friends some of whom need particular watching! Lady Blue manipulates her allies and her mirrors with a deft determination while the misshapen great-uncle Garyus, louring like the elephant-man in my imagination, shows wit and wisdom in guiding his great-nephew along a path of reluctant heroism, There is a poem from the mid-season finale of the sixth Dr Who series that the Wheel of Osheim put me in mind of. "When a good man goes to war." Jal is not a good man, and his grandmother the Red Queen is not - by most standards - a good woman. But it is not for nothing that this trilogy is called "The Red Queen's War," and in this final chapter Alica and her grandson both go to war. (Well strictly speaking, war comes to Jal - I mean, he's not the kind of hero to go out looking for such a thing.) King of Thorns was built around a siege - the chaos of battle and the plans and the sacrifices that Jorg was willing to make to secure a momentary glimmer of advantage and seize that opportunity. In the Wheel of Osheim, Jal faces his own military test though his preference is for. odds stacked so heavily in my favour that the only danger to me is being crushed by them should they fall. However, while Jorg made a habit of playing dice with the fates themselves and winning, Jal's plans have a tendency to unravel faster than a cardigan in a threshing machine. And before long he is remembering. My main rule of running, after "don't stop" and "go faster" is "go high or go to ground." And to be honest, looking at the foes Jal faces, even Jorg might have thought twice about plunging in. For me there were other resonances between Demons Run and the Wheel of Osheim. There are demons, there are men who run (Jal chief amongst them) and women who stay and there is the lost child - Jal's unborn sister, murdered in his mother's womb by the necromancer Edris Dean. The child may have been a pawn in an undead game, but - as the book's cover says - a pawn can change the game. In my limited chess experience that is usually when the pawn is transformed into the most powerful piece on the board - a queen. The threat of that transformation drives Jal and the story on, through Hell (one l or two, it's all the same) and out the other side. Lawrence's Hell (or rather Snorri and Jal's Hel) reminded me of the Robin Williams film "What Dreams May Come" from the 1990s. The film was about heaven rather than hell, as a doctor already hit by family tragedy is flung into heaven by a road traffic accident. But both the film and Lawrence's book paint a vivid and fantastic landscape of the afterlife. A place shaped by each man's imagination, belief and misdeeds and - for someone with as colourful a past as Jal that ensures Hel is not a place to linger in. But not everyone in Hel is an enemy and even in so desolate a place there is a chance of peace for a grieving Viking. However, there are worse things than Hel and the Wheel of Osheim calls inexorably to Jal and any few he can gather around him. The wheel is a machine - the machine that broke the world and allowed magic to leak into it so that men (and women) could manipulate reality by the power of their wills. And the machine is spinning faster and faster. There are two images the wheel conjures up for me, the first - the large hadron collider in Cern - I mean come on! In his helpful "previously in the Red Queen's War" catch-up notes Lawrence describes the machine as "mysterious engines hidden in a circular underground tunnel many miles across" For those with a passing acquaintanceship with particle physics the link will prompt a smile at least, that a machine to probe the limits of reality might in Lawrence's vision of a distant future have ruptured reality so catastrophically. But there was another link too for me - the 1956 film about a 23rd century rescue mission to a space-archaeologist and his daughter wrecked on the eponymous "Forbidden Planet." (film spoiler alert) In that film as I recall it, a lost alien civilisation had been wiped out overnight by their greatest invention. The machine, drawing on unlimited resources of power, could create reality out of imagination; so - in their alien dreams - the nightmares came to life and destroyed them. The foolish archaeologist does not realise how he has - unwittingly - harnessed that same power to unleash his own nightmare on the spaceship crew. In the film only the destruction of a planet could turn the machine off. In Osheim. well read the book and find out. The film, however, has another side to it - for it was seen by many as a re-imagining of Shakespeare's play "The Tempest" where the wizard Prospero lives on an island with his daughter and uses magic to manipulate reality and tease and torment some shipwrecked sailors. And I like that. For in the film magic was re-imagined as science and sixty years later in this the sixth book set in the Broken Empire, Lawrence re- invents science as magic. T.O. Munro. T.O. Munro lives in Belfast in Northern Ireland. Although he started writing novels in his teenage years, it is only in his fifties that he built up to self- publishing the first volume in his epic fantasy trilogy. Having completed the Bloodline trilogy in 2014, he has been working on an extended two volume epilogue exploring the happy or not so happy ever-after’s of some of the surviving protagonists and antagonists. The first of these two books “The Medusa’s Daughter” was published in April 2016. T.O. has built his books in the tradition of epic struggles between good and evil, but with a determination to take a different view of some familiar themes. As a father of four daughters, has been determined to depict female characters in leading roles – a feature that several reviewers have picked up on. “If you’re like me, and you enjoy a good epic fantasy in which female characters (characters, plural, not just one token Smurfette) occupy a central place, here’s one for you.”. At the same time T.O has tried to ensure Niarmit, her allies and her opponents, explore a more nuanced view of good and evil where sometimes good people do bad things for good reasons. He also writes articles and reviews for the fantasy-faction website and enjoys the enthusiastic community of fellow fantasy fans. He can be found on twitter @tomunro, facebook and also goodreads. He is always interested to hear from readers of fantasy fiction be it of his own or other people’s books. Lady of the Helm: Book One of the Bloodline Trilogy (Fantasy) For 5 years Niarmit, once a priestess and a princess of the Salved people, has been an orphan, thief, outlaw and assassin in her own land. For a thousand years Maelgrum, enslaver of the Salved, has been imprisoned and forgotten. Now, from the mountain fortress of Sturmcairn to the forests of Hershwood and beyond, the Salved Kingdom will quake at the Dark Lord’s return. And Niarmit must choose. Can she. aid a people who abandoned her and her father? overcome her darkest fears of madness and betrayal? find a way to kill that which is already dead? “He savoured the moment as he stood at the foot of the outsized bed, loosening the straps of the battered steel breastplate. He tried to gauge from the quivers in the bed clothes where the captain had hidden this evening’s frightened plaything. He guessed which side just as the metal armour fell silently to the marbled floor. Flinging aside the bedding, he had just a moment to register the oddity of the noiseless clang of metal on stone before he saw her. She was not the type that the captain normally picked out for him. In a second he saw she was older, just past the end of adolescence as far as he was any judge of human flesh. Taller than most and sinewy, clad in dark shirt and breeches rather than the night shift he expected. Flame red hair spilled across her shoulders and green eyes blazed at him with a defiance rare in someone brought before Mayor Nordag. Rather than lying trembling within the folds of bedding this one crouched on her haunches looking up at him. The final abnormality he had time to notice was that her hands were not bound behind her, but free infront of her. One held a glinting steel dirk and the other fist grasped a crescent talisman. Then she erupted like one of those amusing jack-in-the-box toys that more astute freeholders had learned to give Nordag as a gift. Driving upwards sword arm outstretched before her, she sprang towards him, driving her blade into his throat even as his mouth gaped open in astonishment. Standing now on the edge of the table her face was level with his chin, her green eyes glaring into his dimming yellow ones.” Wrath of the Medusa: Book Two of the Bloodline Trilogy (Fantasy) Niarmit has, for the moment, escaped the curse of the Great Helm and the grasp of the Dark Lord. Accepting at last a destiny which she never sought, her hopes of uniting the Salved people now rest on the uncertain loyalty of Prince Rugan and his army. Dema the Medusa broods in the captured fortress of Listcairn consumed by a rage for glory to the consternation of friend and enemy alike. Hepdida strives to live up to Niarmit’s expectations as she finds that old nightmares still haunt her days and that a Palace holds more peril than a battlefield. And through it all, Maelgrum weaves his malice as the guilty and the innocent are driven to fulfil his millennium long wait for revenge. The Medusa’s hood was down and her mask was off as she carved, bit and stoned her way towards Rugan’s standard. Even her allies gave her and her steed a wide birth as, at the peak of her powers and the crest of her rage, she swept all before her. A silver soldier, braver than the rest, dared to ride near and catch her sword with his. Their blades both wet with blood of different hues, slid down until they were locked hilt to hilt. “Major, no,” a voice called. “Leave this abomination to me.” Too late, the soldier’s eyes met the Medusa’s sparkling gaze and with an inward breath he turned to overbalanced stone. His mount buckled beneath the weight and the leaning statue of the rider toppled against Dema’s palfrey. As the horse slid and skittered its way free of the falling new formed masonry, Dema slipped from the listing saddle and turned to face the owner of the voice. Master of the Planes: Book Three of the Bloodline Trilogy (Fantasy) The traitor has been unmasked and Niarmit at last has hope of; • untangling the web of evil which has enmeshed her, • taking the attack to the salved people’s oldest enemy, • seizing at a chance of private happiness. But Maelgrum has many allies, new and old. And secrets buried deep can surface still to shake the young queen’s spirit and shatter her plans. And Niarmit must ask again who she was and is and what she must become in pursuit of victory and the answer to the question. “How do you kill that which is already dead?” Torsden, like Kimbolt, wore full armour. The shield was painted blue with a gold stallion rampant upon it, a slightly larger copy of the one Pietrsen carried. “It doesn’t look like he’s accepted his dismissal from your post, Master of the Horse,” Kimbolt said. “He’s an arrogant bastard,” Pietrsen muttered, The arrogant bastard drew a bastard sword from his belt. It was a blade that most men would have wielded two handed, but Torsden swung it in one giant paw, his wrist flexing effortlessly to snap the weapon to left or right. “Remember, Pietrsen, whatever happens, everything is carried out as we agreed.” Suddenly Kimbolt needed the reassurance, the promise. “His strength is as mighty as his ego,” the Master of Horse mumbled on. “Pietrsen, your promise, your word of honour whatever happens.” “You have it, Seneschal.” Kimbolt’s second blew out a soft whistling breath. “You’re a braver man than I, Kimbolt. I just want you to know…” “Save it,” Kimbolt spat. He wasn’t interested in good-byes, at least not from him. “You know what they say about big musclebound men, Pietrsen? Big means slow.” There was a flutter of movement. A thrush darted from the wall of the steading, either disturbed by the creak of the gate closing or drawn to the noise and smells of cooking in the cavalry camp. It flew low, swooping across the ground. Torsden’s sword flashed, a tiny spray of red and two halves of the bird fell to the snowy ground. Lady of the Helm (Bloodline Trilogy #1) by T.O. Munro. Self-Publisher’s Showcase: Today we are joined by T.O. Munro, author of fantasy novels LADY OF THE HELM and WRATH OF THE MEDUSA, books 1 and 2 of The Bloodline Trilogy. Welcome to the Showcase Lounge, Tom. Do make yourself at home. T.O. Munro: Thank you, very happy to be here. SPS: Before we settle down to talk about your work, can you take a moment to tell us a little bit about yourself? TOM: I’m married with four daughters, two of whom are at university, and I have a wonderfully supportive and understanding wife. I live in Kent, but I was born in Wales, my father is Scottish, my wife is from Northern Ireland and as a child I lived in Brazil for three years. So I feel I have a range of cultural influences. SPS: After early experimentation in other genres, what was it that finally encouraged you to publish your first work in the Epic Fantasy genre? TOM: Timing and the miracle of modern self-publishing. When I was younger I did write to agents and to publishers about my various naval novels and murder mysteries but never with enough perseverance. Advances in self-publishing have meant I can now appeal to a readership directly and at a very low cost on both sides. When MP3 music files first came out I was sure there was an equally big market for electronic books and so it is proving to be. The fact that these developments aligned with my fantasy phase is perhaps just a coincidence, but I do feel this series draws on all that I learnt in my early writing experiences. SPS: Lady of the Helm: Book One in the Bloodline Trilogy came out in June of this year. How easy did find the self-publishing process? TOM: Very easy really. There have been lots of self-help guides but I drafted the book in word and then KDP select converted it for kindle use with the minimum of fuss. SPS: In your reviews so far we’ve seen references to both The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit. That must be really pleasing? TOM: It is. I aimed to write epic fantasy and there can’t be many higher accolades than being mentioned in the same sentence as those works. The epic scale is all about world changing events which rest on the actions of a few key individuals and that is the aspect of Tolkien’s work which I was most trying to emulate. However, my story has some key differences, not least in the number of leading female characters. SPS : Tell us a little about the novel; what can someone expect if they sit down today and start reading? TOM: People they can recognise. Yes it is a fantasy world setting in which there is magic and there are monsters, but the story is driven by human attributes like love, greed, ambition, duty. The reader should also find an intricate weave of story lines which cross and merge and as the story accelerates towards its conclusion. I also hope they will enjoy the writing, I have tried to focus on action and dialogue more so than on great descriptive passages. I find that story and character are both developed most rapidly through what people do and how they interact. SPS : The main protagonist, Niarmit has gone from Priestess to Outlaw. How does that shape who she is now? TOM: I really like Niarmit. She is driven by duty and faith. The Battle of Bledrag field was where it all changed, where she lost her family, her position and her homeland. But she didn’t run away, not then. She tried to fight back in a defiant continuation of the conflict. She does what she thinks is right but finds that sometimes being right is not enough. People and situations do not match up to her expectations. That brings some cruel disillusionment for her before events conspire to set her on a new path, embracing new duties and a new family and with that a whole host of new problems. SPS : Can you tell us about where you found your inspiration when writing the Dark Lord, Maelgrum? TOM: To be honest as a teenager I used to play a certain well known role playing game, in the days when we relied on multi-coloured dice and a dungeon master, rather than the easy access of modern Massive Multiplayer online role playing games. I was captivated by the idea of a Lich a powerful undead wizard who had traded his soul for immortality. I suppose my one disappointment in Lord of The Rings was that Sauron’s motivation was never really revealed and he never really existed as a character. Being evil is not a motivation, nor is power without purpose a valid ambition. So I wanted a Dark Lord who was very much a person, an incredibly powerful scary person, who had a thirst for something other than mindless power and who at times would show a sense of humour albeit rather warped. SPS: Was the idea always to produce a trilogy from the outset, or was it originally just to produce a standalone novel? TOM: I started the book ten years ago with some clear ideas of the key nexus points in the plot. But I wasn’t clear about the order I put them in, or how they would link. When I started writing, it quickly felt as though the book was sprawling out of control and so I stopped. I revisited it a couple of years ago and re-plotted how it would all fit together, but even trying to cut and edit my abandoned effort, the novel was eating up words faster than plot lines. With 100,000 words down and only a quarter of the plot covered, I didn’t give up this time. I just realised it was going to be a trilogy. Fortunately, it does divide into what I hope are satisfying separate books, albeit ones that should be read in order. SPS: The second book in the saga, Wrath of the Medusa, was released today. Without giving too much away, what can we expect from this second instalment? TOM: Ooh – not giving too much away. That’s hard. My daughter Tess has been very impatient to know in advance what is going to happen, but I managed to keep some key plot twists back and she really did appreciate it at the end. So I guess the main thing to expect is surprises, which is a feature of Lady of the Helm that seemed to please a lot of readers. There are still the same distinctive characters. Dema the Medusa is a key player. Also much more is made of Prince Rugan the half-elf who becomes a pivotal figure in how the story develops. There are battles and mysteries and some of those moments of human weakness which drive novels of every genre. SPS: How did you find the process of introducing new characters into an already established cast? TOM: It felt fairly natural, driven by the story. I have the world I created and the crisis that confronts it. Then it is a matter of thinking how the individuals and the leaders would respond to that crisis and before you know it this person or that persons has stepped forward and said “hey I’m in your story.” SPS: How does Niarmit deal with the need to work with and trust Prince Rugan? TOM: There are some interesting moments between them, which were quite fun to write. She has good reason for not trusting him, she feels her family were betrayed by him. However, the situation she is in forces her to work with him. It is that clash of duty and emotion, and sometimes the cracks in their relationship really show. SPS: How much research was involved in creating the character of Dema the Medusa? TOM: The Medusa is a well known mythological figure, but it has been presented in so many different ways. I wanted Dema to be as human a monster as possible. It is only from her cheek bones upwards that she is anything other than human. I liked the idea of the mythical powers of a medusa allied to human motivation and ambition. SPS: Can we expect huge a huge battle between the Medusa and Rugan and his army, or are we getting ahead of ourselves? TOM: Oh there has to be battle, but it is more of a starting point than an end point for the story. It is a five part story and the biggest set piece battle is in part one. But battlefields turn out to be not the only dangerous place for Niarmit and her friends, in fact probably not even the most dangerous place. SPS: Once the trilogy is complete do you plan to close the door on the saga, or is there potential for more in the future? TOM: I will bring the saga to a hopefully satisfying conclusion in book three, provisionally entitled Master of the Planes. I know how it ends, I know what the last key scenes are, but there a lot of threads which need to be drawn together towards that point and I am not sure exactly how all the threads will finish. Certainly there are plenty of characters whose story will not end with the final page of Master of the Planes, so there is scope to take some of them forward in a new direction within the same world setting. SPS: Now would be a good time to ask if you can let us in on what we can expect in the near future from the pen of T.O. Munro, presumably book 3 of the Bloodline Trilogy? TOM: Master of the Planes is the obvious next work. I do like to finish things. However, I need to take a bit of a rest to let the ideas marinade in my head before settling down to write. I enjoyed writing the short story of Beldrag Field, 2000 words to fill in some of Niarmit’s back story. I might write a few more short story prequels, just for the fun of it. SPS : Was the Self-Published/Indie-Published route always your preferred route for your work? TOM: Not always, but time is the most precious commodity that any of us have. Finding time to write is hard enough, time to trawl around publishers is much harder. There is enough neglected DIY around the house to keep me occupied for quite a while. Without the simplicity of electronic self-publishing I don’t think I could have got these books out there at all. SPS: We like to spend a moment touching on an individual’s book covers. Can you tell us about how the covers for your Bloodline Trilogy came about and whose handy-work we are viewing? TOM: I knew that covers were very important in marketing your book in a very crowded market. Self-publishing being cheap and simple works very well for me but it also works for everyone else leading to over two million e-books on amazon.co.uk. An eye-catching professional cover is a vital first step in getting your book noticed, your blurb read and your look-inside feature sampled. So, I found a website 99designs which ran competitions for cover designs. You offer a prize and you get some very qualified designers competing to meet your brief. In the end I had 86 design submissions. You can see all the entries on this contest page https://99designs.co.uk/book-cover- design/contests/t-o-munro-needs-book-magazine-cover-222108. I picked an exquisite design by a designer named Paganus, and when it came to Wrath of the Medusa I went straight back to him to see how he could transform my sketchy design brief into a very compelling image. You can see more of Paganus’s work on his website paganus.weebly.com. He is a very gifted and professional designer and working with him – and all the designers at 99designs – was a joy. SPS: If you could give one piece of advice for someone looking to get into writing, what would it be? TOM: One piece of advice ? – ooh that’s hard. How about this, buy and read Howard Mittlemark’s book “ How Not to Write a Novel: 200 Classic Mistakes and How to Avoid Them–A Misstep-by-Misstep Guide” It is very funny and gives 200 pieces of excellent advice all for the price of one. The only book on writing that I have totally re-read. SPS: Thank you for joining us today Tom, and good luck in the future. TOM: Thank you very much for having me. SPS: Wrath of the Medusa is modestly priced on Amazon at £1.99 or $2.99 while for those new to the series, Lady of the Helm can be picked up at the bargain price of £0.77 or $0.99. For a teaser you can even read a prequel short story to the trilogy here on the Showcase. The Battle of Bledrag Field is available right here. TOMunro. My fantasy upbringing was a probably not unusual mix of books and games. I read the Hobbit as a nine year old at school. I struggled to get into Lord of the Rings for years until Avalon Hill published their map and counter based game "War of the Ring" and I sat there looking at these cards and thinking "what's a balrog?" and "why are there two Gandalfs?" I guess the game had a few spoilers for the book, but it finally got me around at the age of 15 or so, to finishing off Tolkien's masterpiece. It helped that AD&D was also emerging around that time and I filled my time DMing for friends and reading White Dwarf. Then computer games versions of AD&D began to appear as a staging post between table top role playing and MMO, and my gaming and reading passions combined with titles such as "Curse of the Azure Bonds" and "Pool of Radiance" the "Crystal Shard" and a dozen other works. I devoured those books at speed and played the games endlessly, particularly the tales of Drizzt Do'Urden by R.A. Salvatore. I will confess I quickly decided to skip all the italicised bits of what seemed to be Drizzt's internal philosophical confessions, though in all honesty they could have been anything from a covert sex scene to a shopping list for all I knew and know. What I craved was action and emotion and I got it. Strings of my psyche plucked expertly by routine themes of love, friendship and honour. But hey, I'm the guy that cried at the last picture in the closing credits of Disney's "Lilo and Stitch" and pretty much everywhere else in the movie. The Forgotten Realms stories convinced me a good story could emerge from a set of role playing game rules. Indeed the early draft of the book that would become Lady of The Helm is remarkable for a slavishly technical adherence to the rules of AD&D almost to the the point that the characters would have been rolling polyhedral dice rather than drawing swords. From thiefly backstabbings to a bizarrely named character called Sergeant Thaco, it had AD&D running through it like Brighton through a stick of rock. But I moved on and my reading did too. Much as Drizzt intrigued me, the endless duelling with Artemis Enteri began to pall. It seemed to me that Salvatore dare not let either one win because he liked them both too much. I stopped reading when the dwarf in the body-armour-come- weaponry appeared, a suit so sharply and dangerously pointed that he needed only to walk into an opponent to injure them, while falling on them was bound to be fatal. And that I guess is my point, the Tales of the Forgotten realm were neither turning point nor dead end, they were a stepping stone a bridge between fantasy games and fantasy fiction, and having crossed that bridge it was important to move on - to recognise that the story is the thing. There are people who can discern traces of AD&D heritage in Lady of the Helm, but I significantly decoupled that when I returned to the book after a gap of ten years. What has pleased readers are the twists and turns, the surprises in the plot and the development of the characters. I have raided mythologies and histories, children's films and war films, for references and inspiration. The nicest comment I have had so far I love your books, just finish readin the 2nd, deprived myself of sleep for 48 hours just to finish it. Patiently waiting for the next!! And in the end it is the story that is the thing. From those AD&D derived stories, many writers have moved on along divergent paths, like stars that shared the same stellar nursery and then drifted in different directions in the aeons that followed. In the end, the story is the thing, making the human story recognisable in a Drow protaganist, and maybe also a Medusa!