Matthew
asked
Brian Staveley:
Can I be bold and ask some more questions? What influences from history (if any) did you draw upon when writing The Emperor's Blades? Do you undertake much research when preparing to write?
Brian Staveley
Fire away.
I taught ancient world history as well as comparative religion for a bunch of years, and the influences from real-world history are legion. Just to pick a few:
The Shin monks pull from Buddhism, Taoism, and Shinto, (though, of course, their religions is very different from any of the above).
The Annurian Empire, in terms of population, level of technology, extent of trade, etc, is similar to Tang era China. It is NOT Tang China, there are hundreds of differences, but that provided a jumping-off point.
The Kettral were my attempt to make a fantasy version of modern special forces, something I hadn't really seen done before.
The conflict between the Church of Intarra and the Unhewn Throne has myriad historical precedents all over the world.
As far as research goes, most of the initial inspiration came from the work I was doing to prepare my classes. I have, however, read plenty of books and articles while I was writing my own books to fill in some blanks and to glean more inspiration...
I taught ancient world history as well as comparative religion for a bunch of years, and the influences from real-world history are legion. Just to pick a few:
The Shin monks pull from Buddhism, Taoism, and Shinto, (though, of course, their religions is very different from any of the above).
The Annurian Empire, in terms of population, level of technology, extent of trade, etc, is similar to Tang era China. It is NOT Tang China, there are hundreds of differences, but that provided a jumping-off point.
The Kettral were my attempt to make a fantasy version of modern special forces, something I hadn't really seen done before.
The conflict between the Church of Intarra and the Unhewn Throne has myriad historical precedents all over the world.
As far as research goes, most of the initial inspiration came from the work I was doing to prepare my classes. I have, however, read plenty of books and articles while I was writing my own books to fill in some blanks and to glean more inspiration...
More Answered Questions
Tasos
asked
Brian Staveley:
Love the books! A couple of questions: Have you heard the audiobook version of the novel? If you have, curious about how it feels to hear hour thoughts spoken out loud And, is there anything you wish you had done differently in the first book of the trilogy? Small or big Thanks and can't wait for the rest of the books
Raja Selvakumar
asked
Brian Staveley:
Hi Brian- first off, thank you. Thank you particularly for the vaniate- it's an unbelievably powerful concept. I tried searching for it and found that you had previously mentioned that you received the inspiration from philosophical work. My question to you is where can I read more about concepts like the vaniate? I have plenty more questions, but Goodreads will break out into hives if I ask away :)
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