In anticipation of the release of his new novel, Neverwinter, on this Tuesday, October 4, R.A. Salvatore sits down with Unwinnable’s own George Collazo and talks about his new book, his craft and future projects. Part 1. For your enjoyment, Part 2 of 3:

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Unwinnable: One great element of the book is now that Drizzt is older, generational repercussions really seem to be a key. You definitely take advantage of the long lifespan of an elf and I’ll say better than any vampire book ever has. You can really see him go from point A to B in this. They say that people completely change every seven years. Working with the character for so many years, do you feel like it has been three lifetimes?

R.A. Salvatore: Yes, at least three. If you remember the book The Lone Drow, I had a specific purpose in mind for the character as I was going through. I didn’t really start out with that, but that is how it developed through the book. Whenever I sign that book for someone I will typically write, “What it is to be an elf.” In that book, Drizzt is dear friends with an elf and she explains to him that to be of the long-living races and keep your sanity, you have to be able to let go of that which you lose, because just about everybody around you is going to die. You are still going to be young, many times over.

So you have to be able to live your life episodically, like five human lives instead of one elven life and that really is the lesson for Drizzt. He is still trying to figure out if that is correct or not, so he is trying to do it. He is taking her advice, he is letting go of the past and he is hooking up with Dahlia, taking that chance and that risk and just being a little reckless.

If I look back at Drizzt, I know this wasn’t intentional from the beginning; it became more and more so as it went on. If you read The Crystal Shard, which was the first book that I wrote, there is a scene in which Drizzt and Wulfgar are going into a lair of giants. They have no business going in there, they have virtually no chance of survival and Drizzt is laughing; he doesn’t care, he is reckless. He had nothing to lose as his friends grew around him and his love grew around him, but then all of a sudden he has something to lose.

If you look at Drizzt through the middle books, he becomes much more cautious. He becomes much less willing to hang it all out there – he does when he has to but he doesn’t want to. Now he has nothing to lose again.

Unwinnable: It is interesting – he was almost still personally reckless but more protective of those around him than himself.

R.A.: In the book Starless Night, which is about halfway through the series, he actually leaves and