Interview - Rob Sanders

A first for Imagined Realms!

So thoroughly did I enjoy Atlas Infernal (see my review here: part 1, part 2 and part 3), that I felt compelled to not only contact Rob Sanders to express my appreciation, but also tentatively query if he would be open to answering a few Q&As that had been buzzing around my head since I put the book down.

Very graciously Rob accepted and I present to you the results for your reading pleasure below.

I would really like to thank Rob for his willingness to participate in this process. Imagined Realms is very much a tiny minnow in this electronic sea we call the internet, and frankly I was not sure what response I would get.

When it came, it made my day.

Enough of me, here's the interview:

 

1. How did you come to write for Black Library, and what attracted you to the 40k universe? What was the earliest image of the universe (picture, miniature, fluff piece, book etc) that you can remember?


It was a combination of two things really. The first was that I had played some Games Workshop games in the past and so I had a head start in the background. To tell the truth, the background interested me more than the game dynamics. My friends and I would spend much more time setting games up than actually playing them! Later, when I was looking for prospective markets to send my creative work, I discovered that Black Library published a monthly short story collection called Inferno! Magazine. Untried authors were encouraged to send work and so I sent a piece called The Cold Light of Day about a Kislevite whale hunter chasing a Chaos corrupted whale across the seas near the top of the world. Inferno! Magazine was succeeded by an emagazine called Hammer and Bolter that offers similar opportunities to beginning writers, placing them alongside fiction from established BL authors. My own recent short stories The Long Games at Carcharias and Iron Within feature in Hammer and Bolter 3 and 5 respectively.

Like a lot of people, I am attracted to the Warhammer 40k universe for a whole host of reasons. I’ve always liked the mythological structures behind the setting – particularly in respect to human ‘history’: the usurping Horus and the Emperor he betrays; a civil war between seeming demigods; a corrupting conflict that rips the galaxy apart and is ill-understood by the common citizens of a slowly disintegrating empire. I also like the gothic nature of the setting and the way in which humanity – as a xenophobic and warmongering race – attempts to dominate the galaxy. It is unapologetic and, although I don’t personally agree with the sentiment, it is a refreshing and likely accurate depiction of humanity’s future goals.

My earliest recollection of the Warhammer 40K universe is probably the incredible artwork that featured in rulebooks like Rogue Trader and background books like Realm of Chaos. The artists working with Games Workshop and Black Library do a great deal to establish the ‘flavour’ of the universe and their contribution shouldn’t be underestimated. I feel very lucky to be working with artists like Jon Sullivan and Stef Kopinski, who created front covers for my novels Redemption Corps, Atlas Infernal and Legion of the Damned. Their visions are ambassadors for the narratives, characters and worlds presented within.      

2. Do you participate in the hobby aspect of 40k at all? If so, where do your passions lay?

Between working as a secondary school English teacher and an author, I don’t get very much time to participate in the hobby, which is a shame. When I did play, I played orks. At that time everyone wanted to play Space Marines - and I doubt that has changed. The orks seemed like the underdogs on the tabletop and that appealed to me. My sons play, however, and also enjoy the artistic aspect to the hobby. They have an ork army and a Black Templar force and from time to time I will pick up the dice and the paintbrush with them. The game seems to move a great deal faster than when I used to play it: perhaps that says more about me than the changing rules of the game!

3. Your latest Black Library novel, Atlas Infernal, is very different to your previous work, Redemption Corps. Were there any particular narrative themes and elements of the 40k universe that you specifically wanted to explore in this book?

Redemption Corps’ concerns are those that would seem familiar to a regular Black Library reader: the soldiers of humanity pulling on every resource in order to halt the progress of an aggressive and unchecked alien species. There is, of course, a great deal more to the novel than that: but at its heart it is a story of man versus alien beast on the lonely fringes of the Imperium. For Atlas Infernal, I wanted to move the action to the corrupted dreadspace of the Eye of Terror - well within the borders of the Imperium - and place the reader uncomfortably between the uncompromising will of the Inquisition and the myriad insanities of Chaos.

I wanted to explore a battle of wills and intellects between two characters - Inquisitor Bronislaw Czevak and Ahriman of the Thousand Sons - so powerful, that it imperils the Imperium and bends the very fabric of time and space. Beyond the galactic cat and mouse game played by these characters and their doomed followers, the setting really interested me. To do the Eye of Terror justice – a place where reality and the warp exist together and the desires of Ruinous powers shape the very nature of existence – you are going to need a little more that the odd lake of blood and a fiery sky.

Inquisitor Czevak’s possession of the Atlas Infernal and his unique mode of travel mean that action and intrigue in the novel are allowed to unfold across many worlds in the daemonic maelstrom of the Eye. In these settings, I’ve tried to retain a warped logic at the same time as subjecting the characters to the imaginative lethality of daemon worlds, corrupted civilizations and planets where the opposing wills of the Chaos gods battle for supremacy in the hearts of the damned. As well as the Eye of Terror, the reader also gets to follow Czevak into the epic grandeur of places like top secret Inquisition fortresses, the Eldar webway and the Black Library of Chaos itself. There is certainly something for everyone in Atlas Infernal and if readers wish to learn a little more about the book then I’d advise them to check out Imagined Realms’ excellent and in-depth review of the novel.   


4. By the very nature of the work they undertake, Inquisitors are often accompanied by some unusually... unique individuals. How did you decide on the characters that you wanted accompanying Czevak/Klute? Was it a ‘function first’ type thought process (for example; ‘Well, my inquisitors are going to need a warp-seer/space marine/rogue trader etc) or was the process more organically linked to the themes/tone of the story you wanted? Were there any inquisitorial band member concepts that you considered but rejected?

Great question. I can completely see where you are going with the ‘function’ approach. Inquisitors have retinues. Rulebooks help to identify what type of individuals an inquisitor is likely to have accompanying them. These individuals are organized according to function. Certainly, this is a fun way to approach the characters in an Inquisition novel and I can tell you that I spent a long time ensuring that I was up to date with the background material. I can’t speak for other authors or reader-gamers who might particularly appreciate that approach, but I tend to approach characters differently.

If the characters themselves are planets and moons in a system, then choices regarding those characters are rather like the gravity that holds them in place and binds them to one another. These are structural choices that are unseen but incredibly important. They exert influence, establish an interrelationship and maintain a balance and narrative harmony amongst a cast of characters in a way that makes sense to the reader. Those structural influences and the way in which characters affect one another were the earliest considerations, before more surface concerns like function within the Inquisitorial setting.

I’m interested that you mention tone. In the same way as setting, action and narrative, characters also contribute to this. Some readers like the characters they follow to be universally likeable, but this is unnecessarily limiting for an author. Likeable characters suit a specific kind of narrative. There is no point in trying to crowbar them in where they don’t belong. Besides, there is no universal consensus on what is strictly ‘likeable’. Certain narratives and settings suit antiheroes, with more questionable qualities. We follow these characters for slightly different reasons in fiction but they are no less appealing in their own way. Lesser but more obviously ‘likeable’ characters would probably not survive ten seconds in the Eye of Terror, against enemies as devious and ruthless as Ahriman of the Thousand Sons!

In terms of character concepts that I considered and rejected, I was fortunate in so much as in the novel we see Czevak at different times in his inquisitorial career. In the interests of realism, the Inquisitor has a different retinue at different points. This, of course, lends the narrative opportunities for more colour and variety. Each retinue member, however - no matter at what point they join Czevak – are present because of the structures identified previously. In whatever significant or small way, the narrative needs them. Ultimately, it would be fair to say that Czevak is the main character and that Atlas Infernal follows his adventures. Atlas Infernal is a single book and it would be unfair to compare the cast of characters and the depth of their involvement to those in, for example, a series. Perhaps further Czevak adventures will afford these characters even more opportunity for adventures of their own.    

 

5. On a similar note, the antagonists in the novel were also vividly described. Were the harlequins/rubric marines (as examples) specific elements of the setting you wanted to write about, or were they chosen because of the story you wanted to tell? In other words, what came first: the story or the characters?

It has to be character first, really. Although, the development of interesting narrative arcs, setting and action set pieces can often develop alongside the primary concern of character, it must start with character because their needs and desires will lead both the writer and reader into conflict with others. These ‘others’ become the novel’s natural antagonists. Readers of Atlas Infernal have noticed that they get a lot of bang for their buck. Many elements of the Warhammer 40k background are touched upon, but this isn’t because I started with a checklist! Czevak has some extraordinary capabilities and retains possession of artifacts that other powerful individuals are willing to destroy entire worlds to acquire.

Choosing Czevak or a character like him means that antagonists are going to be varied and deadly. He doesn’t only have members of his own retinue acting contrary to his wishes but in what they see to be his best interest, he has a galaxy of enemies. The Eldar of the Black Library of Chaos are hunting Czevak to take back the Atlas Infernal. Puritan factions within Czevak’s own Inquisition wish to destroy him to purge their ranks of what they see to be a dangerous radical. The Chaos sorcerer Ahzek Ahriman will stop at nothing to acquire both Czevak and the Atlas Infernal in order to gain access to the Black Library and exalt himself to godhood.

All of these factions bring their own forces into the conflict: Harlequins; Grey Knights; Rubric Chaos Space Marines and daemonic entities. On top of that, the setting itself presents Czevak with enemies he must overcome just to reach his objective. The Eye of Terror comes replete with the lost and the damned – the slaves of Ruinous darkness.  

6. Atlas Infernal depicts in some detail the fabled Eldar Black Library of Chaos. Was this infamously mysterious element of 40k lore considered to be a sort of ‘sacred cow’ at all? Did your depiction receive any particular scrutiny or have to be given the official GW ‘ok’ in anyway? How do you find the process of writing for Black Library?

The Black Library of Chaos was really interesting to write. Very few pieces of fiction have touched upon it and so therefore it was largely a mystery. When writing a novel for Black Library, an author understands that as well as receiving editorial feedback regarding aspects such as style and description, they will also receive scrutiny regarding the way they depict background elements. The editors try their best to ensure that while authors are allowed to creatively interpret the intellectual property of the Warhammer 40k universe, there is also continuity and agreement between the presentation of shared elements.

As the question suggests, I fully expected a good deal of feedback regarding the way in which the Black Library was presented. To be honest, everyone was very happy with my first instincts and very little needed to be modified in a second draft. Other elements needed more work to ensure that they matched up with the concerns of other novels. Thousands of years pass between my depiction of Ahriman in Atlas Infernal and Graham McNeil’s impressive introduction of the character in A Thousand Sons, but it was still important to ensure that readers of both books could feel an undercurrent of the same character.

In turn, any author expecting to include Ahriman in their narratives would, of course, consult Atlas Infernal. This raises one of the challenges for writers of Warhammer 40k fiction. You have to bring a powerful imagination to your fiction, while at the same time working within the discipline of a shared and established setting. Readers don’t want mere write ups of tabletop battles but at the same they still want a Warhammer 40k story.

There is then the added complication of the reader’s own vision of the shared universe and their ‘sacred cows’: things that any one writer is going to find almost impossible to predict. Many Black Library readers are console or tabletop gamers, partakers in online or face-to-face roleplay and/or writers of their own Warhammer 40k fiction. They are creators in their own right – whether that be scenarios, armour paint schemes or their own parts of the fictional universe. They have strong feelings about the way background should be presented because they have already invested a lot of themselves creatively into that background.

These considerations – both editorial and in terms of reader expectation – create special challenges for the Black Library writer. At the end of the day, all authors can only stay true to themselves. Those that wish to bring their creative vision to others are encouraged to do so through the excellent publishing opportunities Black library offers debut authors. Existing authors can only tell the stories they wish to tell in the way they feel they should be told.

7. Some questions on your other job (as head of English at a local secondary school). How do you balance your writing with your day job (and do you have any advice for people who want to write, but are consumed by a more mundane day job (like me))? As someone battling at the coal face of English language education, how difficult is it to get kids to appreciate literature in this internet driven, short attention span LOL OMG WTF world we’re living in? Do you get much recognition amongst your students for your BL work?

I won’t lie to you: it is difficult balancing the two. Some authors might have other ways to support themselves beyond a full time job. Others simply jump into fiction writing without a parachute. You cannot help but admire their courage and commitment. I am more of a pragmatist. Part of my job requires you to be well versed in the classics. I’ve read novels like Gissing’s New Grub Street, detailing the miserable existence of the desperate and struggling author: it’s not pretty. It is a universal piece of advice in the publishing industry: don’t quit your day job. You’ll know if you’ve achieved enough success as a writer not to have to rely upon a day job. I certainly wouldn’t advise it for people who simply decide they are going to write or even achieve their first contract. There are too many variables. Best to have a back-up plan.

            I think in some ways it’s better to come at it from a different angle. If you are the kind of person who can put in a full day’s work and be there for your spouse and children and then still have the unbreakable will to sit before a blank screen - sometimes late at night – and create something out of nothing: a something that others come to enjoy, respect and are happy to pay for – then I think as a writer you are going to do well. I’m right at the beginning of my writing career, so I don’t know what will happen but in some ways I believe that success should be hard won. Again, going back to the classics (as you expect a teacher might), all the greats overcame serious obstacles in their lives in order to hone their craft and achieve their success. There were no casual creators – even among those who might have cultivated a public image as such. Of course, I’m not comparing myself to classic writers – but you would be surprised at where some of them started their careers and where, equivalently, they would be writing if they were around today.

            In terms of teaching, literacy is a huge problem in British schools. Part of it is a cultural phenomenon. Getting large numbers of young people to read is not a problem in other parts of the world. The other problem is that nobody over here – who has the power to make sweeping changes to the Education system – has the faintest ideas what to do about the problem. They are too busy moving pieces around the board and convincing the public that they are busy doing something when in fact they are doing nothing but that: currying political favour out of voters.

It has been that way for a long time and there is no sign that anyone with any true understanding of the problem and the will to do anything about it is on the horizon. The question describes it as a ‘coalface’ and you could be more right than you know. I’ve never worked easy schools. I tend to go where I’m needed and can make a difference. I have a passion for Education but I have put in more than my tour of duty in British schools and little by little I am scaling back my commitment to give more to my writing career. Perhaps I should write a book about it!

            It’s funny you mention recognition for BL work. I tend to keep the two separate in school. I’m not there to sell books to my classes or in turn have them give me five star reviews on Amazon in a computer room (although thirty five star reviews does sound appealing!) The other day a student did bring Redemption Corps to a reading session – which was a nice moment and students do occasionally bring in books for me to sign.   


8. Good science fiction reflects on the way we live now. What, if anything, do you think the 40k universe succeeds at in teaching our youth about the real world? Or is it really only just a game to be enjoyed (or a book to be read) with a few drinks?

In the real world, I think that a game or book to be enjoyed is a precious thing. In a world that seems to be dominated by the drudgery of work and the unrelenting pressures of modern living, I think taking an hour or two to immerse yourself in another world – with friends or on your own – is essential. It makes me happy to think that I might be a small part of that. That something I have written might be part of the enjoyable, relaxed and fun section of their day.

            In regards to what a science fiction setting like the 40k universe might teach anyone - let alone young people – about the real world, I think a great deal. On the surface, the setting might appear to be about soldiers in colourful armour killing aliens in a far future. Like all science fiction, its concerns tend to reflect the present rather than the future.The Imperium is a human empire in a state of decline and stagnation. It is dominated by ignorance, corruption and xenophobia and views itself not only surrounded on all sides by external threats, but also at peril from enemies within. Certainly it could be argued that many twenty-first century nations and groups of nations can be seen in the same way. Their political leaders garner votes and lead through fear. Terrorist attacks, weapons of mass destruction, environmental disaster, economic collapse: it doesn’t really matter – as long as people are kept fearful, they will empower leaders with their blind support in the hope that they will be saved from an unseen evil.

In the Warhammer 40k universe, planetary governors, the Adeptus Arbites, the Ecclesiarchy, the Inquisition, the High Lords of Terra and ultimately the Emperor himself rule the Imperium in this way. Every Imperial citizen must give his or her all for the Imperium: questions are not tolerated and refusing to comply is an act of heresy. Most citizens in the Imperium do work themselves into the dirt in an act of blind compliance, however. Imperial propaganda has sufficiently terrified them enough to fear the unseen and distant threats of alien races, agents of corruption or deviancy closer to home.

            We are told that in the far future there is only war. The Imperium is thinly spread, trying to secure the borders of its galactic Empire and in terms of Warhammer 40k gaming and fiction often finds itself under attack. This is quite misleading, however. As the Horus Heresy helps to teach us, in order to hold such a vast resource-rich empire, humanity has crusaded amongst the stars, invaded and conquered the planets and territories of other galactic races. Alien invasions in the 40k universe can largely be ascribed to the Eldar, the Orks and Necrons simply reasserting their territorial rights and taking back a little of what was once their own. Even Chaos – the Primordial Annihilator – has been in galactic existence longer than humanity has been a spacefaring race. When really thought about it, this positions the Imperium as the terrorists and invaders, rather than these external threats. This finds an interesting parallel - certainly in the Imperium’s prosecution of its will – in the way that western countries have been the ones waging war in modern times (regardless of their reasoning) in Middle Eastern and North African countries.

            The final comparison that I think is interesting to make is in terms of technology. The Imperium is in decline and regressive in its approach to technological development. It is stuck in a particular stage of technological advancement, very much as the twenty first century world seems to be. It is true that in recent times the technologies of convenience have seen some development. Personal technologies – the development of which might make individual companies very wealthy – have seen some progress: phones, computers, certain medical advancements. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, however, we seem to have made little more progress than at the beginning of the twentieth.

The automobile is more comfortable to drive but in essence is no different from when the technology was initially developed. Buildings are still thrown up stone over metal as they were one hundred years ago. Aeroplanes carry more passengers, slightly swifter and to more destinations but the design of aircraft remains largely unchanged. Even weapons of war – an area in which you would expect to see a great deal of development – are largely the same. Knives, guns, grenades, tanks and battleships were all with us during the First World War and still remain the staple armaments of twenty-first century military forces. As a planet we’ve had the capabilities of nuclear technologies for over half a century but are still tentative and unsure about its use in our power stations.

The most telling - from a science fiction point of view – is space travel. Man went to the moon over forty years ago. Most unmanned probes sent to other astral bodies are still pretty basic and usually suffer some kind of malfunction. Our only space station hovers barely above our upper atmosphere and I watched a documentary the other day in which NASA claimed it would take at least another ten years to develop the technology to return to the moon. People can claim all kinds of very specific technological developments during the twentieth century but the life changing and world changing developments we were told to expect from even the most modest science fiction and actual scientists themselves has failed to materialise. It could definitely be argued that we are suffering a period of technological stagnation. In that way, the concerns of the fictional Imperium can be seen to have some parallels.

On a lighter note ...       


9. The subheading of the book – ‘An Inquisitor Czevak novel’ implies that there might be more tales of these particular inquisitors you’d like to tell (in addition to the short story 'Necessary Evil' contained in the BL Live! 2011 Chapbook - sadly unavailable down here in Australia). Do you have any plans for a follow up to Atlas Infernal, and if so, is there anything you’d like to tell us?

There is certainly opportunity for more Inquisitor Czevak adventures. I’d love to continue the character’s story. I am committed to a range of different projects at the moment but certainly have plans for where the Atlas Infernal might take Czevak and his retinue next. It is early days yet, in publishing terms, but I’ll keep you informed. It is a shame that the short story Necessary Evil isn’t more widely available. Perhaps it might be released at a later date in something like Hammer and Bolter.

It is a kind of a prequel to Atlas Infernal and sees Inquisitor Czevak arrive on the daemon world of Nereus in the Eye of Terror. Nereus is covered in a brimstone ocean, thrashing with daemons of the deep but also terrorised by flocks of furies in its tumultuous skies. A warp vortex called ‘The Craw’ routinely spits out vessels snatched by violently erupting warp storms on an Imperial trade route outside of the Eye. These vessels have crashed over thousands of years and created a rusted archipelago and a community of survivors called ‘Perdition’s Landing’. Czevak is there to find and destroy a Ruinous artefact from a vessel that crashed there before the arch-sorcerer Ahriman can arrive with his Rubric Marines and claim the item. What rapidly comes to puzzle Czevak, however, is how such a ragtag community of castaways can survive in the deadly environs of a daemon world. I’m afraid you’ll have to read the story to find out what Czevak discovers. I hope that it will be available soon.

10. Your next BL book is a Space Marines Battles novel, Legion of the Damned. Like the Black Library of Chaos, this group of mysterious astartes is another element of the 40k universe rarely touched on directly in Black Library fiction. Was there something specific that drew you to them? Did you have to ‘fight off’ other authors for the chance to write about this particular space marine 'chapter'? Is the process for submitting/writing books in the 'Space Marines Battles' series any different to what you went through with Atlas? Have you found there were any specific challenges in writing a novel where most, if not all, of the characters involved were adeptus astartes (an assumption on my part as I obviously have not yet read the book!)?

(Sigil's note: these questions were asked prior to Xmas, meaning the ebook version of 'Legion of the Damned' was not yet available for reading! The ebook version is available now, although you'll need to wait a couple of months for the paper version)

The process of writing a Space Marine battles book is a little different. With Atlas Infernal, I had a good deal of freedom, apart from constraints that I imposed upon myself (e.g. Czevak’s background). The Space Marine battles series usually details with established battles detailed in rulebooks or codexes. I went for something a little different, however, selecting the Legion of the Damned as a phenomenon, rather than the specifics of a single battle. In this way I had a good deal of freedom to establish the setting, scenario and thematic structures surrounding such a battle. I’m not sure anyone else had thought of that before – so in that respect, I didn’t have to fight any of the other authors off. My editor liked the idea and I took it from there.

            One issue that choice did present me with was a point of view consideration. If a novel is about an Ultramarine battle then it makes sense that it is told from the point of view on an Ultramarine. This cannot be done with the Legion of the Damned. They are a mysterious phenomenon – and largely should remain so in order that I not ruin the tabletop game for large numbers of players. It is difficult to give the Legion of the Damned the narrative point of view. It would destroy any mystery surrounding them – and mystery is one of their enduring qualities.

            The rules surrounding the Legion of the Damned detail how they appear on the battlefield only when they are most needed, to turn the tide of the battle and help their beleaguered brother Space Marines secure victory. I wanted to stay true to their nature and so chose another Adeptus Astartes chapter – the Excoriators – to assume the narrative point of view. I have ensured that the Legion of the Damned appear all the way throughout the novel, but - in accordance with the nature of their phenomenon - we witness and experience them (as they always have been in the background) through the eyes of other battle brothers.

            Like many of the Space Marine Battles novels, I chose to stick largely with a Space Marine perspective, while at the same time moving around different human narrative points of view in order that we see the demigods of the Imperium through a mere mortal’s eyes. The Excoriators’ serfs and bondsmen feature in this way, as do members of the Ecclesiarchy, common cemetery worlders and maniac members of the Khornate Blood Crusade called the Cholercaust that the Excoriators and Legion of the Damned face on the battlefield. I break this only once I think, with a short section I wrote from the logic engine perspective of an Adeptis Astartes’ Thunderfire cannon. Just keeping it fresh and interesting!    


11. What else are you working on that you’d like to tell us about (either BL or other)? Are there any other elements of the Warhammer 40k or fantasy worlds that you’d really like to explore in the future?

For Black Library, I’m working on some Warhammer projects, which is great since my first short story for them, The Cold Light of Day was a Warhammer piece. I’m also looking forward to getting to grips with more stories from the Horus Heresy, after my work in the HH anthology Age of Darkness, in addition to more work with the Alpha Legion. I have several other non-BL projects that are speculative at the moment that I’m keeping close to my chest. I’m trying to be more methodical about such pursuits. What is the point of sitting on fantastic ideas if you don’t try to realise them?

12. Hypothetical question to finish up on: Rob Sanders, sick and tired of living the life of a moral and law abiding citizen, succumbs to the temptations of chaos. Khorne, Nurgle, Slaanesh or Tzeentch. Who gets your eternal soul and why?

Well, first, I am sick and tired of living the life of a moral and law abiding citizen. How did you know? Loving this question. I’m a fairly even tempered person, so I suppose Khorne will simply have to do without my soul. Nurgle trades in hopelessness and despair – and I’ll never give in to that. Slaanesh is tempting, since a life of unrestricted pleasure sounds like something I could get on with, but I think I work too hard to be a soul-viable prospect. Ultimately, I think that I’m going to have to give my eternal soul to Tzeentch. Tzeentch represents hope and ambition – both of which I’m blessed with. Tzeentch also has a penchant for grand, convoluted schemes. As an author often tasked with constructing plots with enough twists and turns to keep my readers happy, I expect he has long had his beady eye on me.

Thanks for reading. I’d also like to say thanks to Sigil at Imagined Realms for the opportunity. I wish Imagined Realms well and will follow its further development with interest.      I encourage you to do the same.

Rob Sanders
http://rob-sanders.blogspot.com/

 

Well there you go, I hope you enjoyed it.

Rob is a consistent blogger, and his site can be found here.

As I'm sure many of you already know, his Black Library books can be found at your local Games Workshop, bookstore (Dymocks is great in Australia if you can't get to a GW - just look for the giant Salamander marine) and of course via the Black Library website which can be found here.

I really enjoyed putting these questions together and presenting them here at IR - this is exactly the type of thing I set this site up for.

Rob's willingness to participate has inspired me to contact other authors and artists to see if they would also be interested in answering some questions I'd like to throw their way.

Stay tuned. 

EDIT: Oh and I should add...sometimes after reading anthologies, I often get a little forgetful with regards to which author wrote what, but I'd like to add now that Rob's short story The Iron Within, which can be found in the Age of Darkness anthology is brilliant.