Back in 2001 I was finishing my manuscript for my epic fantasy, that had taken 7 years of fairly solid writing and rewriting to complete. It evolved massively during that time - but at every stage, I wrote in a vaccum.

I would only look at another fantasy book to sneer at it - I wouldn't read writing books because I figured they were mostly written by armchair critics.

And I had an abominable degree of arrogant self-belief. I thought I was on a par with Shakespeare!...