Richard Strachan’s latest Black Library novel set in the Mortal Realms is out soon. To get ready for this tale of a family of witch hunters in the realm of Ghur, we sat down with him to talk all about Hallowed Ground.
Warhammer Community: What influences and inspires you as an author?
Richard Strachan: More or less everything you read or watch or listen to can count as an inspiration or an influence in one way or another. I’ve written stories that have been inspired by a stray lyric in a song or a glimpse of something out of a bus window, so it’s always hard to pin it down. Landscapes inspire me more than anything or at least give me a compulsion to write – the strangeness of ordinary places, coastlines, rock formations, and so on. Also, I’ve said before that the process of writing can be inspirational in itself – you end up following a train of thought that hadn’t occurred to you before, that seems to lead you into new images and new ways of describing them, and then the language just seems to take over.
WarCom: How do you approach writing within the Mortal Realms?
Richard: I always start with the maps – flicking through the core book and looking at how the landscapes are presented, and then imagining the characters moving across them. If you start with a character in a landscape, it always feels like you can go anywhere from there.
WarCom: On to your latest book – how would you describe Hallowed Ground?
Richard: Hallowed Ground is the story of two witch hunters, father and daughter, who are trying to come to terms with their terrible recent experiences. After playing a pivotal role in the events of the Siege of Excelsis,* they find themselves drawn into a new conspiracy that has some connection to the horrors of their past, where the safety of an already battered city, and their own relationship to each other, is on the line.
WarCom: How did you prepare and research before putting pen to paper?
Richard: The book takes place in the aftermath of the events in Broken Realms: Kragnos, so I was lucky enough to get an advance look at that and plan accordingly – one of the perks of the job! This gave me a good insight into Galen and Doralia – the two witch hunters – and the realm they’re fighting in. Excelsis has also featured in Nick Horth’s excellent Callis & Toll books (City of Secrets and The Silver Shard), so I made sure to read those for some background info.
WarCom: What can you tell us about the book's protagonists? How would you describe Galen and Doralia?Richard: Galen and Doralia ven Denst are witch hunters in the Order of Azyr. They’re two of the most hard-bitten, experienced operatives in the order, who are willing to do whatever it takes to complete their mission. But as we follow them in this book, we realise that this uncompromising attitude comes at a price, and that perhaps they’re beginning to unravel under the pressure of all the terrible things they’ve been forced to do over the course of their careers. They’re father and daughter, but it’s not the easiest relationship for either of them. Is that relationship a strength, or is it perhaps a weakness?
WarCom: How was it going from writing aelves in The End of Enlightenment to writing about humans in Hallowed Ground?
Richard: Speaking specifically to these characters, it was in many ways quite similar. In The End of Enlightenment I wanted to show that the Lumineth Realm-lords are not cold-blooded or unfeeling. In fact, they feel volcanic emotions, but their whole society is designed around keeping those emotions in check. For Galen and Doralia, it’s the same – they need to keep a lid on their emotions so they can do their jobs, and it’s when that lid starts to fall off that things get interesting. Writing about the human city of Excelsis was great fun, though, tracking through the alleyways and marketplaces and cemeteries of somewhere a bit dirtier and dingier than a well-ordered aelven temple in Hysh.**
WarCom: And, finally, why should people get stuck into Hallowed Ground?
Richard: As anyone who’s read CL Werner’s classic Witch Hunter books will know, the witch hunter is an archetypal Warhammer character, but we haven’t seen much of them in the Age of Sigmar before now. Hopefully, this should give readers more of an insider’s view of what working for the Order of Azyr is like and how even the toughest agents can sometimes find themselves out of their depth amongst the Mortal Realms’ most dangerous denizens. It’s a mix of swashbuckling adventure, dark fantasy, and horror, with an emotional core as we explore the ven Densts’ tangled, traumatic relationship.
Thanks, Richard! Excited to read Hallowed Ground? Check out some of Richard’s Black Library short stories – Bird of Change, Dark Master, and Blood of the Flayer. Sign up for the Black Library newsletter for all of the latest updates, including details of when Richard’s new novel will be published.
* Read about how the council of war in Excelsis prepared for war in the free short story Premonitions.
** Learn a bit more about the mysterious land of Hysh in our guide to the realm.