While War of the Four Gods takes place in a pseudo-Scandinavian world, the story is based on the English Civil War. So most of the major players that characters are based on will be English. The king who was unfortunate …
One of the most successful German Protestant generals, Bernhard was extremely influential during the middle part of the war, especially in the years following Gustav Adolf’s death in battle. He’s also an intriguing and somewhat controversial figure, and another one …
For someone who was involved in the Thirty Years War a mere two years, Gustav Adolf left an oversized impression. But that was par for for course for a man who spent his life virtually racing from one unqualified success …
Armand Jean du Plessis, Cardinal-Duke of Richelieu and of Fronsac, sometimes called the Red Cardinal, was one of the most important political figures in French history. He’s had some pop culture fame by virtue of being portrayed as the arch-villain …
It’s been a while since I’ve done one of these posts, but now that I’m in the process of editing Valley of the Shadow, it’s time to start introducing some of the new characters and the historical figures they’re based …
This is sort of a reblog. I did a bunch of research-heavy posts back in the days before anyone was reading this blog. Also, I’ve learned a lot since then. Polish hussars were the super-badass heavy cavalry of the early modern period, which is …
Whenever I think I’m not quite depressed enough to do this story justice, I look at something like this.I came across this map on a German Thirty Years War reenactment group website. The site is pretty interesting if you can …
The fantasy version of this guy wasn’t going to come into play until the second book, but he’s just too much fun to leave out. Christian, Duke of Brunswick-Luneburg and Bishop of Halberstadt, was the same age as Frederick and …
The mere mention of musketeers brings to mind attractive men wearing large hats, tall boots and fighting with swords. And yet, we are not here just to stare at pictures of such. Although it was a hazard of my “research.” …
Since the majority of my main characters are based on historical figures, I thought I’d profile some of them, and then let you figure out who’s who. No, actually I’ll totally hit you over the head with the who’s who. …