The Questioning: Peter McLean

The Questioning is where everything gets upside down. Authors have become interrogators and Bloggers get interrogated. Rest assured, no one gets hurt (much) and everyone has fun (eventually).

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In the Author Edition of The Questioning, it’s usually the author who gets to ask me silly questions, but Peter McLean, author of The Burned Man and The War for the Rose Throne series, opted for me to be the interrogator in this Asylum 5th Anniversary Bonanza Special Edition. I warned him that it won’t be a regular interview and he still agreed, so that’s on him.

Peter McLean was born near London in 1972, the son of a bank manager and an English teacher. He went to school in the shadow of Norwich Cathedral where he spent most of his time making up stories.

He has since grown up a bit, if not a lot, and spent 25 years working in corporate IT. He is married to Diane and is still making up stories.

He is the author of the War for the Rose Throne series, beginning with Priest of Bones.

Connect with Peter McLean

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Hi Pete, it’s awesome to chat with you again. Please don’t mind all this equipment, they are here for your safety, there is nothing to be afraid of. How are you enjoying life in the Asylum?

Hey Timy, good to talk again. As for life in the Asylum, of course I am loving it, O Queen. What other safe answer could one give? *twitch*

Thanks for the cake, by the way. It’s made me feel very welcome.

Tell me, what archetype would you be in a magical tournament to the death?

The Black Magician of course. I have all my ritual ingredients and my grimoire with me. I will summon a demon from the Deep Hells to end them all. The Ritual only takes three days and… oh cock. I appear to have been decapitated by a large, angry person with an axe. 

If we invited one of your characters, who would you like to have a chat with, and why Terrible Timy?

Sorry Terrible Timy but it’s definitely Bloody Anne. Despite her charming name and murderous character she is probably the closest thing to a decent person in the entire series. Also she’s funny and can hold her drink. I deliberately wrote Anne to be the best mate I wished I had, so Anne all the way. 

If we could send you to Ellinburg, what type of character you would be and how long would you survive?

A spy for the Queen’s Men, definitely. I work in InfoSec for my day job and that’s about the closest thing to an equivalent there is in my world. As to survival, well, that’s a bit of a crapshoot in Ellinburg. Not being a front line fighter I’d probably do ok until someone blew my house up in a grandiose gesture of revenge directed at someone else entirely. 

Which place in your opinion has the most magical/fantastical/creepy atmosphere? Can you show us pictures?

Edinburgh, definitely. It’s the capital city of Scotland and my wife’s home town, dating back to the Bronze age and heavily developed in the 17^th and 18^th centuries. Edinburgh was actually the main influence for Ellinburg itself, with a few of the landmarks moved around and the river added. There are some great pictures here: https://www.darkedinburgh.co.uk/gallery/ 

Right, let’s go with some hard questions. Where is the treasure hidden? How many limbs will you lose getting them?

Treasure? You think authors make enough to have treasure? That’s hilarious. The real treasure is memories, and they’re locked in my heart. 

I saw that picture of you with the long hair, looking into the distance, it definitely had brooding rockstar vibes and I could imagine it for a cover. If you had to pose as a model for a book cover, what type of book/cover it would be?

Oh gods, did you? How on earth did I let that happen? Anyway, these days if I was to be the cover model for a book cover it would be a biopic about a murderer. The older I get, the more I look like Charles Bronson.

For context:

I know you have wild hedgehogs in your area. So, let’s imagine you can communicate with them (talking animals!), and now you have a whole party of spiky adventurers! What you will be up to?

We do! The thing is though, hedgehogs aren’t exactly what you’d call adventurous little critters. We’d probably just be pottering around the back gardens of the neighborhood eating worms and dodging foxes. 

We can all agree RJ Barker has some pretty cool aesthetics both in person and at home. What would you like to get from him as a gift?

He has left the stuffed wallaby with wings to me in his will, he just may or may not actually know that yet. 

The wallaby in question:

Sadly, we came to the last question, it was great to have you, but it’s time to say goodbye. There is only one door to this room, and you are free to leave, but before that, can you guess where we hid the keys?

Oh gods, you made me swallow it, didn’t you? I knew there was a lump in that cake… 

Check out my previous (real) interview with Peter McLean, or the other Author Editions or Blogger Editions of The Questioning!

If you’d like to try this feature out, please contact us for further details!