research facts

Writing historical mystery requires working within two sets of rules, the ones that govern mysteries and the ones for historical novels, and although those rules can be broken, I prefer to “play fair” with the reader when I can. Much of the action in my upcoming Shinobi Mystery, BLADE OF THE SAMURAI, takes place on the grounds of the shogunate–the compound where the shogun lived, which also housed the government offices. (The Japanese word for the shogunate government is bakufu, though I substituted “shogunate” in the novel to make it easier on native English speakers.) When writing the novel, I researched medieval