Rock, Paper, Swords!

Our guest today is Nicholas Morton.

Nicholas is an associate professor at Nottingham Trent University. He is the author or editor of nine books, including The Field of Blood and several other books about the Crusades and medieval Europe and the Near East. His latest book is The Mongol Storm: Making and Breaking Empires in the Medieval Near East. The book tells the story of how the Mongol Empire upended the geopolitics of the Near East, reshaping the balance of world power and transforming the region forever.

Welcome to RPS, Nic!

Our guest today is Matt Lewis.

Matt is an author and historian of the medieval period, with a particular interest in the Wars of the Roses and Richard III. He has written biographies of Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine, Henry III, Richard Duke of York, and Richard III, as well as accounts of The Anarchy, the Wars of the Roses, and Rebellion in the Middle Ages.

Matt is also chair of the Richard the Third Society and host of the popular Gone Medieval podcast.

Welcome to RPS, Matt.

Something a little different today - we have no guests for a change! Instead, Steven interviews Matthew about his brand new book A DAY OF RECKONING, the third in his A Time for Swords series, which came out yesterday. It's a fun episode covering various aspects of the writing/publishing process, and Matthew even tells us the title of his NEXT book (the Western he's been talking about for ages, it's finished)!

Give it a listen, and make sure you buy A Day of Reckoning...

Our guest today is Angus Donald, author of the Outlaw Chronicles, about a medieval gangster called Robin Hood, a 17th-century series about an unusual but rather brilliant chap called Holcroft Blood. And writing as Angus Macallan, he has also tried his hand at fantasy with the Gates of Stone.

His most recent novels are in the Fire Born series, set in 8th century Europe. Book four in the series, King of the North is published by Canelo on 28th September. 

Welcome to RPS, Angus.

http://angusdonaldbooks.com/

Our guest today is Paul Finch. Paul Finch is an English author and scriptwriter. He has a diverse and very successful career, from the popular TV programme The Bill, to horror and fantasy stories and films, Doctor Who spin-off stories and the incredibly successful gritty crime series of DS Mark Heck Heckenberg novels, with over 1 MILLION book sales!

Paul’s latest pivot has been to move into the historical fiction genre, writing under the name P.W. Finch. USURPER, set in the cataclysmic year of 1066, was published earlier this year. 

Welcome to RPS, Paul.

Our guest today is Dr Joanne Ball. Joanne is a Roman archaeologist and battlefield archaeologist based at the University of Liverpool, with a PhD in Archaeology on the subject of Roman battlefield archaeology. 

She is a regular contributor to several magazines focused on ancient history and was co-editor of Ancient World Magazine. And is soon to have published the Publius Quinctilius Varus: The Man Who Lost Three Roman Legions in the Teutoburg Disaster.

Welcome to RPS, Joanne.

Our guest today is Ethan Bale, author of The Swords of the White Rose series.

Book 1, Hawker and the King's Jewel came out last year and the follow up, The Lost Prince, has just been published.

Ethan Bale (Clifford Beal), is a former defence journalist. Despite writing about modern military technology for much of his career, he was always passionate about history, particularly the Renaissance and early modern Europe. 

Over the years he has been flung about in military aircraft, trained in 17th century rapier, fired flintlock pistols, messed about in boats, and ridden both horses and motorcycles. These days he is usually found wielding a pen and not a sword.

Welcome to RPS, Ethan!

Alex Gough is an author of Roman historical adventures. The Carbo Chronicles, including Watchmen of Rome and Bandits of Rome, was written as a result of a lifelong obsession with ancient Rome, and the culmination of a lot of research into the underclasses of the time. He has also written a collection of adventures following Carbo and other characters from Watchmen of Rome, where you can learn more about their rich lives.

Alex loves our theme song so much that he recorded a cool tribute to it which you can find at the end of the episode.

If you're a musician and want to record your own cover version, send it to us and we'll use it in a future episode (unless it's really, REALLY bad lol)!

Artificial Intelligence, or AI for short, is a hot topic at the moment. Perhaps the HOTTEST topic. It is cropping up in the news every day and there are predictions that it will take our jobs away or even take over the world! It probably isn’t quite as dire as those predictions would have us believe, but there is no doubt that AI generated text and images are here to stay, not to mention many other uses that we haven’t even foreseen yet. There will be impacts on our daily lives and creatives are especially worried about their livelihoods as computers become more and more adept at doing what only humans could do till now.

We’re not experts on the subject and it is a HUGE subject, but we thought we’d have a quick chat about what AI can do now, what it might be able to do in the future and some of the complex issues arising as a result of this new technology.

Cover image was created by AI from directions Matthew gave it. It's supposed to be Beobrand from his Bernicia Chronicles lmao!

Ben Kane will need little introduction to many of our listeners, but here goes anyway. Ben is a historical fiction novelist, best known for his books set in the ancient world, particularly the Roman empire. His series include The Forgotten Legion, Spartacus, and the Hannibal series of books. 

In 2013, Ben along with fellow novelists Anthony Riches and Russell Whitfield - walked the entire length of Hadrian's Wall for charity, wearing full Roman military kit. Then in 2014, they walked again in, but this time in Italy, raising over £26,500. A film was made of their walk, entitled The Road to Rome with Sir Ian McKellen providing the voiceover.

More recently, Ben has diversified into the medieval period with a trilogy of novels about Richard the Lionheart. His new book, published on 25th May 2023 is, Napoleon’s Spy and marks a further time shift into the early 19th century.

Welcome to Rock, Paper, Swords, Ben!

Peter Gibbons is an author based in Kildare, Ireland. He completed a Law Degree in Liverpool University before embarking on a career in the Insurance Industry.

After many years working in the UK & Ireland he decided to follow his dreams and wrote his debut novel, Viking Blood and Blade.

After smashing into the independently published historical fiction scene in 2021, he had his second series picked up by a publisher and went on to win the prestigious Kindle Storyteller Award in 2022.

Welcome to Rock, Paper, Swords, Peter!

Incredibly, we managed to get an interview with the legendary Tull frontman (Steven's favourite band in case you didn't hear him mention it on every previous episode...)!

Ian talked with us about the brand new, rocking Jethro Tull album RökFlöte, Norse mythology, Vladimir Putin appearing at a Tull meet-and-greet, the time journalists demanded details of his upcoming gender reassignment surgery, Broadsword 40th Anniversary boxset details, Under Wraps getting REAL drums, how he's a "bit of a fan" of Motörhead despite the umlauts, bands like Mötley Crüe using backing tapes on stage instead of playing completely live, how performing helps his asthma (not COPD!), how work is going on the NEXT album and its planned release date, and how he's a cranky old guy like Morrissey these days!

We were told we'd get, at most, 45 minutes with Ian but we ended up chatting for over 80 minutes and it was just brilliant. We think you'll enjoy this episode. Give it a listen and check out RökFlöte, it's superb!

David Gilman has worked as a firefighter, professional photographer, he was a soldier in the Parachute Regiment’s Reconnaissance Platoon and a Marketing Manager for an international publishing company in South Africa. From 2000 until 2009 he was principal writer on the TV series A Touch Of Frost. 

His MASTER OF WAR series follows the fortunes of Thomas Blackstone, a village stonemason in England sent to fight with King Edward’s army as an archer against the French in the 14th century in the 100 years war.

David is also the author of two standalone novels for adults, The Last Horseman, set during the Boer War and Night Flight to Paris, a WW2 novel that pits a reluctant hero against the Nazi forces in Paris in 1943.

The Englishman is a new thriller series introducing Dan Raglan, a contemporary knight errant who served in the French Foreign Legion. The second book in the series, Betrayal, published in 2022, was followed by Resurrection, in 2023.

His DANGER ZONE YA adventure series, featuring plucky hero Max Gordon. THE DEVIL’S BREATH won the prestigious French award, Le Prix Polar Jeunesse, was shortlisted for the Manchester Book Award and the Spellbinding Award, nominated for the Carnegie Medal, and picked for the UK government’s recommended reading list for boys. It was also shortlisted for the 2010-2011 Isinglass Teen Read Award in New Hampshire, USA.

Welcome to Rock, Paper, Swords, David!

IAN ROSS is the author of the “Twilight of Empire” series, six historical novels set in the early 4th century AD, the era of the Roman emperor Constantine.

The first of the series, “War at the Edge of the World”, was published in the UK in 2015, and the sixth, “Triumph in Dust", in 2019. His books have subsequently been published in the USA, Australia, Spain and Italy.

His forthcoming novel, “Battle Song”, the first of a trilogy set in medieval England, will be published by Hodder & Stoughton on March 30th 2023.

Welcome to Rock, Paper, Swords, Ian Ross!

During the 90s Giles Kristian was lead singer of pop group Upside Down, achieving four top twenty hit records! As a singer-songwriter he lived and toured for two years in Europe and has made music videos all over the world.

Giles is half-Norwegian and his family history inspired him to write his first historical novels: the acclaimed and bestselling RAVEN Viking trilogy. For his next series, he drew on a long-held fascination with the English Civil War to chart the fortunes of a family divided by this brutal conflict in The Bleeding Land and Brothers’ Fury. Giles also co-wrote Wilbur Smith’s No.1 bestseller, Golden Lion. In The Rise of Sigurd novels he returned to the world of the Vikings. His Sunday Times bestseller, Lancelot, is currently in development for TV. He followed Lancelot with Camelot, and now, Where Blood Runs Cold is his debut contemporary thriller.

Welcome to Rock, Paper, Swords, Giles Kristian!

So many people have told us they really enjoy the short intro/outro music we recorded for the podcast so...We've written a full four minute theme song complete with daft cheesy lyrics, full-on rock vocals, and searing guitar solos (two of the buggers!). It's just a bit of fun, we hope you like it...

Look out for another bonus episode tomorrow with some news about the podcast!

Dio, Maiden, Queen,

And everything in between,

If you like your rock,

Come hear us talk,

And we'll keep it (mostly) clean

We chat about writing scenes,

And native British greens,

Adventure and action,

Get your book traction,

It's the podcast of your dreams

RPS chorus

History comes to life,

With a wicked Saxon knife,

Lord of the Rings,

And other things,

Enjoy it with your wife

From cowboys to ancient celts,

We'll tell you just how it smelt,

With special guests,

We're druid blessed,

We're gonna make faces melt!

Guitar solos

Chorus

Dan Jones is a bestselling historian, TV presenter and award-winning journalist. His books, which have sold more than a million copies worldwide, include THE PLANTAGENETS, THE TEMPLARS, THE HOLLOW CROWN. His book CRUSADERS was published in autumn 2019. He co-authored the Sunday Times bestseller THE COLOUR OF TIME and THE WORLD AFLAME, published in March 2020, with Marina Amaral.

Dan has also written and presented numerous TV series including 'Secrets of Great British Castles' (Netflix, Channel 5), 'Britain’s Bloodiest Dynasty: The Plantagenets' and 'London: 2000 Years of History'.

Most recently Dan's historical fiction debut, ESSEX DOGS, the first installment in a trilogy set during the Hundred Years War, was published by Head of Zeus on 15 September 2022.

Welcome to Rock, Paper, Swords, Dan Jones!

***This episode was our most streamed during 2023!***

Slaine from 2000AD. Sherlock Holmes. Dr Who. Primeval. Stargate. Return of the Jedi. Ghost-writing for genuine legends of the rap and hip-hop scene.... Our guest today is probably the most prolific and best-selling author you've never heard of! And he also writes for games, including the major Xbox/Playstation hit, Battlefield 3!  

Not only that, he used to write the odd story for classic "top-shelf" magazines like Fiesta and Escort, and no, those were NOT about 80's motor cars, they were FAR sexier than an RS2000 or XR2...  

Join us today, as we chat with Steven Savile!

Matthew just makes it all up as he goes along.

Since last week's interview with Carol McGrath had some audio issues that forced us to shorten it somewhat we thought we'd put out this little bonus episode as a bit of fun - a freebie if you will! We read out some funny or just odd reviews of our own books. This was something Steven suggested because he thought it would be a right laugh but, in fact, as we started putting together the material for the episode it became clear reading 1 star reviews of our stuff wasn't as hilarious as we'd expected - it was actually a bit depressing! So this is a short bonus rather than a full length episode. Enjoy! ;-)

We'll have a regular episode next week as usual, and we'll be discussing what we use to research our novels. Books, websites, podcasts....Make sure you're subscribed so you never miss an episode, and please do leave a 5 star rating if you enjoy what we're doing!

The boys discuss the history of Hallowe'en! Includes some chat on Steven's spooky novella Knight of the Cross, and Matthew's short tale, Kin of Cain. Sleep paralysis, black eyed kids, folklore, Beowulf, pumpkin and turnip carving, and loads more... Turn out the lights and lock the doors for this fun look at everyone's favourite spooky night of the year!

Matthew and Steven have spent the morning watching the first two episodes of Amazon's new show based on Tolkien's Lord of the Rings - RINGS OF POWER. In this special bonus episode they talk about their first impressions of this highly anticipated (and vilified by people who've never even seen it) new show.

Is the casting any good? What about the music? How does it look? Can it compare to the Peter Jackson movies? What the hell is a 'harfoot'? 

IS IT ACTUALLY ANY GOOD? 

And we also address the burning question so many people had when the trailers started to appear: Is it ruined by being too "woke"?!

Join us on Rock, Paper, Swords! to find out the answer to these questions, and much more. And don't forget, we'll be back again next week with another episode as usual.