Gabriel Woods asked Lissa Oliver:

What research did you carry out for your novel Nero?

Lissa Oliver Initially, I read Suetonius and Tacitus as Penguin Classics and really enjoyed them, but was surprised by what I read of Nero, who differed greatly from the Hollywood versions I'd been used to. So I went back through both Roman authors, as well as Cassius Dio, and began a biography. I then found four modern academic biographies of him, all telling the same thing, so I switched to writing his story as fiction and bringing him more to life. Michael Grant, Jerome Carcopino, plus several others that were borrowed from libraries, were soon strewn around me like a little magic circle! I had several notebooks and used them all at once, trying to write events in order of date, as Suetonius and Tacitus were sensationalists who often took events out of context for more dramatic effect. After at least four years, I began to write the actual straight biography, which I used as a skeleton frame for the fiction-style story. I always think of it as about four years, but realistically, and according to friends, it was nearer seven. But basically, just reading contemporary accounts, academic biographies and reference books on daily life in Rome, currency values, politics, etc. Just full-on immersal!

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