Goodreads asked David W. Tollen:

Where did you get the idea for your most recent book?

David W. Tollen My girlfriend (now wife) was studying to be certified as a public school teacher, and she was having trouble with history. So I took her history outline and give her a four-hour lecture/review of all the history on the test. It worked like a charm, and she had no trouble passing. Afterwards, I wondered, "Why is all this history rattling around in my head," (I'm a big history buff) "and what can I do with it?"

I started thinking about a book that covers as much history as my girlfriend's (again, now wife's!) test. But I wanted to write fiction. My first thought was to write a series of short stories, taking the reader through the entire history of Western Civilization (something like Rutherford's novels: Sarum, etc.). But I wanted to tie it all together somehow (tighter than Rutherford does). One day while driving, it hit me: turn the timeline into an actual, physical river in a fantasy world. So the characters travel through history, while having a journey-type adventure--allowing me to cover multiple periods in a single story. Thus was born my current book, The Jericho River.

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