James Islington

I kind of wanted to do a bit of a sci-fi concept but in a fantasy world, especially because as soon as you move into a fantasy world it can be a bit looser, like I don't have to come and learn all the physics.

Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly.

Music

Hi.

Thanks for having me.

Clearly too much.

Yeah, very much so.

Yeah.

Look, it was probably Magician by Raymond Feist.

I read that when I was 14 and that was my first fantasy book.

And before that I was, you know, I was a reader, but I was never really –

I guess, enthused.

And that led to, you know, Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan.

That was huge in my teens.

That was coming out as I was in high school.

And so my friends and I were, you know, every time a new book would come out, we would get excited and we would theorize about what was coming next and all that sort of stuff.

So those two series are really what shaped me, I think.

That was when I kind of decided that I wanted to be a writer.

But it was Magician was the starting point.

It was genuinely.