Mr. Cornwell, I have a few more boring technical questions if you please… 1. When researching a battle with the intention of using it as a set-piece in a novel, what processes do you go through to plot it out that are different from having read about that same battle in the past for your own pleasure or general interest? What are some points of advice you could offer a fiction writer in regards to approaching his research? I know you’ve said in the past that you approach it in a very non-academic way- but there has to be some method to the madness right?

2. I notice the best of your books happen over a very short period of time- Rifles, Siege, Waterloo, etc..and you hardly, if ever, use flashback to derail the momentum of the story. Does a love of theatre inform any of the narrative choices you make in your work? I have been fascinated with the tight continuity of time and place in fiction since watching a production of The Tempest at a young age. Do you feel that the best stories are constructed with tight unity of time and setting in mind? Do you always have an eye out for this sort of thing when you are writing a story?

3. Finding out, via this website, what books and authors inspired you, both fiction and non-fiction, then going back and reading them, has been quite an education for me. If you could assemble a required reading list for the young historical adventure writer what are some of the more important titles that would be at the top of the list?

4. How do you regard the Phillip Horatio Hazard books of V.A. Stuart or the George Abercrombie Fox books by Adam Hardy. I have recently cobbled together the completed runs of both series through many trips to the used bookstores. I ask about them because they seem very Sharpe-like though they were written in the 70’s.

5. Finally, What is the one thing that you know about writing now that you wished you knew when you started out? Thanks again for your time, R. Kulb P.S. Some day you are going to have to write some type of book about your creative processes so I can finally stop bugging you with all these questions…