As one of the main progenitors of the subgenre known as “scoundrel lit,” how do you feel about the direction the genre is moving in?

I tend to think of it as “unheroic fantasy,” but certainly there seems to be a real current within epic fantasy lately toward darker, grittier, more morally ambiguous, more character-centered writing. I heartily approve of it because it’s to my personal taste, but also because I feel that epic fantasy had become a bit repetitive and predictable and variety has got to be a good thing. George R.R. Martin, I think, was very important in demonstrating that this kind of work could be commercially successful, that you could produce books that were recognizably epic fantasy—and gave readers everything they hoped for from the form—but at the same time were unpredictable, challenging, and unapologetically adult in every sense of the word. But guys like Fritz Leiber and Jack Vance were writing morally questionable heroes and seedy settings long before I was born, so I’m not sure I regard myself as any kind of progenitor, just a humble practitioner in a long and proud tradition.

Alright, not so humble.

Your books are often compared to films. How does your film editing background influence your books?

I spent ten years or so as a freelance editor, mostly working on live music (concerts, festivals, and awards shows) and documentaries. Certainly, that was important experience. I think it gave me a good idea of timing, of how to come into and get out of a scene, of how you can cut between different strands of action to get the most drama out of both. I was also lucky to see some really skilled producers work on scripts for documentary, where the aim is often to tell the story in the most economical number of words. But above all, I think it taught me how to get on with people and the value of listening to others’ opinions and making changes. As an editor, you can’t be too precious—you do your best with the material, but if a director, producer, or client wants something different, you have to make changes. You might resent that to begin with, but often you find that looking again with the benefit of a new viewpoint allows you to make improvements. The same is true of a writer. You need to be able to listen to your editor, listen to the opinions of readers, and not necessarily do exactly what they tell you, but always be looking for ways to improve what you’re doing.

Will we see previous characters returning in your next novel? Maybe even Murcatto?

Having finished the First Law, I really wanted to write some standalone books set in the same world, which could be accessible to new readers and serve as a jumping-in point but that hopefully, at the same time, would serve as some kind of continuation of the life of the world for readers who had read the trilogy. So I wanted there to be plenty of characters in common—for major characters from the trilogy to appear in the background of the standalones while minor characters took center stage. I enjoy the sense of threads coming in and out of the narrative, of the nods and references that long-term readers might pick up on and the sense it gives of a complete, interconnected world. The next novel takes place in the North, so we’ll see a lot of the Northman characters from the First Law making an appearance—Black Dow, Caul Shivers, Princes Calder, and Scale, among others, as well as quite a few Union soldiers—Kroy, Jalenhorm, Bremer dan Gorst. Even a certain Magus makes an appearance. Most of the characters from Best Served Cold are sitting this one out, but they’ll be there on the bench in case I need them in the future.