Drakenfeld

Acknowledgements

Though the act of writing is one generally done in isolation, there have been many people who have helped me greatly with detailed feedback and criticism of early drafts. So a big thank you is owed to: Jared Shurin (particularly for his more abusive comments), Anne Perry, Eric Edwards, Ben O’Connell, Liviu Suciu, Kim Curran, John French and Marc Aplin. Thanks, also, to my agent, John Jarrold; and to the wonderful team at Tor UK who, for some reason, keep encouraging me to write books – and most especially my editor Julie Crisp, for making this a significantly better book.

Fantastical literature nearly always draws on historical sources, whether consciously or otherwise. Though Vispasia is a secondary world, many readers will observe that it’s clearly inspired by the classical cultures of the ancient world. I like to think Vispasia could sit somewhere just off the oldest maps as a hitherto unrecorded territory. So, I feel I should at least share with readers a selection of the incredible books that have helped me to understand cultures far older than our own. Some of those that have best brought such worlds to life include: Tom Holland’s Persian Fire; Edward Gibbon’s The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire; Suetonius’ The Twelve Caesars; Pliny’s Natural History; Procopius’ The Secret History; Livy’s The Early History of Rome; and Mary Beard’s Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town. Drop me a line through my website markcnewton.com and I’m sure I can recommend more.