A crumbling empire: the story behind THE RARKYN'S FAMILIAR

When the first true chapters* of The Rarkyn’s Familiar made their way onto paper in 2009 as part of a university assignment, little did I know how much time I would be spending in the world of the Illredian Empire.

*When I say “true” here, I mean something semi recognisable to the book’s final story. I’d been playing around with the core idea for a good while longer.

In the years leading up to those chapters, I’d undergone a slow realisation of just how ugly the world could be. The US invasion...