Having just published ‘Aniketos‘, it’s interesting to look back on ‘In the Company of Friends‘ to compare the two books. One difference I’ve noticed is that Hephaistion did not have much to say for himself in Book 1, but in Book 2, he has developed …
Read MoreThe Palace at Pella
In Book 1, “In the Company of Friends”, much of the initial action takes place within the Royal Palace at Pella, so I have given here a few notes on what that building was like. The excavation and restoration of the site is on-going so …
Read MoreDirections as Points of the Compass
The points of the compass, so familiar to us today, were unknown to the ancient Greeks. Of course, they had a sense of direction, but it was dictated by the natural phenomenon of their world. Using the sun and stars and natural landmarks they found …
Read MoreGetting Inspiration
All writers have different ways of getting ‘inside’ their characters. I find that sketching them gets me really thinking about who they were and how they might have interacted with their world. From the proud and haughty to the loyal and true, somehow their characters …
Read MoreNaming Choices in Book 1
I had to make some choices in translating names from Greek to English. For the horses, that was an easy choice, I just used the straight translation of their names – Oxhead for Boukephalas (Βουκεφάλας), and Fearless for Atromitos (Ατρόμητος) Hephaistion’s horse. But for the …
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