Elizabeth Moon publishes LIMITS OF POWER (UK | ANZ), the penultimate volume in her epic fantasy series Paladin’s Legacy, today. As an author who’s returned to the classic fantasy world she first created in the Paksenarrion series again and again, we asked her how she keeps the details about this world realistic, and consistent . . .

My first visit to New World Arbalest wasn’t a quest for crossbow knowledge, but a chance to see a period (real, not modern make) rapier . . . to hold and flourish a sword that had been used, several hundred years ago, either to mark someone’s rank or kill someone’s foe.  I had met “Master Iolo” (David Watson) and his wife Kathleen – both fencing instructors – at a convention.  But in that first visit I saw the shop at the back of the house, full of wood, sawdust, shavings, antlers, arrays of tools, and crossbows in every stage of construction.  I knew very little about crossbows then, except that I wanted to learn more.

Writers are often research junkies.  We need to find out about all sorts of things in order to write stories that go beyond our own personal experience. Whether it’s a thriller or a mystery or a contemporary slice of life story – or epic fantasy – there’s always something we need to learn.  So we haunt libraries, have overstuffed bookshelves in our own homes (or, now, overstuffed e-readers, or both), spend hours hunting down facts (we hope) on the internet.  When we meet someone with first-hand knowledge of something we know we’ll need for later books, that poor soul hasn’t a chance.  A writer in full research mode is like a hungry vampire: we will get what we want . . . (more…)