Dear Joe Abercrombie author of the book The Blade Itself,
Having started reading your book it occurred to me that you use a lot of description for certain aspects of the story such as the fencing matches. Do you fence? If not, did you do a lot of research in order to learn enough about the topic to write about it in such detail? In fact, all of you fighting scenes are quite thoroughly written. Did you just kind of make it up as to how you envisioned it or did you do research? I ask this because I really like the practicality of your fight scenes. They aren’t embellished or made too simple. They are how one would think a fight would be in the real world. If we still fought with swords that is…
Also, much of this story seems to be modeled off of medieval times. (as many fantasy stories are) Was this something you studied as well? Or was it based off of prior knowledge? I don’t really know why but it seems to me, from reading the book, that you must have researched these topics. They seem too precise to just be made up or based off of prior knowledge. Anyway, I hope the book continues to impress me with it’s quality.
A content reader,
Virginia
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Dear Virginia,
It would be rude of me not to reply to such a well-mannered letter. Glad to hear that you're content. I'm not a fencer, nor an expert in hand to hand combat. I'm a film editor by trade, and when writing action scenes (or indeed anything else), I try to visualise the shots that might make up a sequence, then describe them, if that makes any sense. I'm glad you find them realistic and unembellished, because stripped-down realism is pretty much exactly what I'm going for.
As for the research, I do read a lot of history, but I don't research specific points that much. After all, part of the appeal of fantasy is that you can combine all kinds of different notions, cultures, elements of costume and etiquette however you please. I just shove it all in the way it seems most effective. Perhaps the reading of history gives some of it a whiff of authenticity? I try to be light on the worldbuilding, so that the characters can come through more strongly.
I hope the book continues to impress you too.
A content writer,
Joe Abercrombie
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