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The line of demarcation between history and legend is too thin to observe while writing; the two overlap each other unconsciously and unknowingly.

History is only conjecture, and the best historians try to do it as accurately as they can. They try to accurately reassemble the facts and then put them down on paper.

Writing historical novels can be dangerous. We need to be as accurate and as fair about the historical record as we can be, at the same time as creating our fictional characters and, hopefully, telling a good story. The challenge is weaving the fiction into the history.

History should not be left to the historians. Rather, be like Churchill. Make history, and then write it.

We've all faced the charge that our novels are history lite, and to some extent, that's true. Yet for some, historical fiction is a way into reading history proper.

We want a world with both historians and novelists, don't we? Not with one or the other. Every fiction writer crosses the line that divides artistry and documentation - or erases it.

Anything based on ancient texts is difficult for a modern reader to get their head around.

Some novelists want to give people in history a voice because they have been denied it in the past.

Writers are historians, too. It is in literature that the greater truths about a people and their past are found.

I feel like it's hard to get into historical novels where you know what the story is far too well.