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Oliver Bowden

Anton Gill (aka Oliver Bowden) has been a full-time professional writer since 1984, and in the course of the last 27 years he has published 35 books. Gill was born in Ilford, Essex, the son of a German father and an English mother, and grew up in London. He is an acclaimed novelist and Renaissance historian currently living in Paris, France. Bowden has written novelizations of several of the Assassin's Creed console games.

Oliver Bowden is a pen-name (a pseudonym adopted by the author) in order to hide his true identity. However, his profession and location are accurate.

According to Bowden's interview with UbiWorkshop, he is an avid gamer and gains much of his inspiration for character development throughout the writing process from playing the Assassin's Creed series.

Gill ceased being Oliver Bowden some years back and the author Andrew Holmes (Sleb, 64 Clarke) has published the last six titles of the Assassin's Creed series (The Secret Crusade, Forsaken, Black Flag, Unity, Underworld, and Desert Oath) using this pen-name.


“The crowd began to murmur, but then a firm voice stilled it. Giovanni Auditore was speaking.'It is you who is the traitor, Uberto. You, one of my closest associates and friends, in whom I entrusted my life! And I am a fool. I did not see that you are one of them!' Here he raised his voice to a great cry of anguish and of rage.'You may take our lives today, but mark this - we will have yours in return!'-Giovanni Auditore,Before his execution”
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“It is a good life we lead, brother,' said Federico with uncharacteristic solemnity.'The best,' Ezio agreed.'And may it never change.'They both paused - neither wishing to break the perfection of the moment - but after a while Federico quietly spoke.'May it never change us either, fratellino.”
Oliver Bowden
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“Laa shay'a waqi'un moutlaq bale kouloun moumkine' -the Wisdom of our Creed is revealed through these words - 'We work in the Dark, to serve the Light. We are Assassins.' --Machiavelli”
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“Everything is permitted, Nothing is true.”
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“Mother. Father. I am sorry. I have failed you both. I made a promise to protect our people, Mother. I thought if I could stop the Templars, If I could keep the revolution free from their influence, then those I supported would do what was right. They did, I suppose, do what was right - what was right for them. As for you, Father, I thought I might unite us, that we would forget the past and forge a better future. In time, I believed you could be made to see the world as I do - to understand. But it was just a dream. This, too, I should have known. Were we not meant to live in peace, then? Is that it? Are we born to argue? To fight? So many voices - each demanding something else. "It has been hard at times, but never harder than today. To see all I worked for perverted, discarded, forgotten. You would say I have described the whole of history, Father. Are you smiling, then? Hoping I might speak the words you long to hear? To validate you? To say that all along you were right? I will not. Even now, faced as I am with the truth of your cold words, I refuse. Because I believe things can still change."I may never succeed. The Assassins may struggle another thousand years in vain. But we will not stop.""Compromise. That's what everyone has insisted on. And so I have learnt it. But differently than most, I think. I realize now that it will take time, that the road ahead is long and shrouded in darkness. It is a road which will not always take me where I wish to go - and I doubt I will live to see it end. But I will travel down it nonetheless.""For at my side walks hope. In the face of all that insists I turn back, I carry on: this, this is my compromise.”
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“Don't think I have any intention of caressing your cheek and saying I was wrong," he said softly as I watched the life ebb out of him. "I will not weep and wonder what might have been. I'm sure you understand.”
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“No!" He recoiled. "You and I are finished.""Son..." I started.But he rounded on me. "Do you think me so soft that calling me son might change my mind? How long did you sit on this information? Or am I to believe you only discovered it now? My mother's blood may stain another's hands, but Charles Lee is no less a monster, and all he does, he does by your command.”
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“It is too late for me to feel paternal now. Whatever inside me that might once have been capable of nurturing my child had long since been corrupted or burned away. Years of betrayal and slaughter have seen to that.”
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“Did you know?" I snarled. "Did you help take my father and corrupt my life?”
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“Il mio vi ammazzera tutti!'- 'My man is will kill you all!”
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“I will journey to the black heart of a corrupt empire to root out my foes. But Rome wasn't built in a day and it won't be restored by a lone Assassin. I am Ezio Auditore Da Firenze. This is my Brotherhood.”
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“Listen, do you really expect me to believe that God lives beneath the Vatican?- Ezio Auditore”
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“While I thought that I was learning how to live, I have been learning how to die.-Leonardo Da Vinci”
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“Self expression is a vital part of understanding life, and enjoying it to the full.”
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“Seré tu guía, Ezio. Pero antes debes aprender a abrir tu mente, y a recordar siempre lo siguiente: nada es verdad. Todo está permitido.”
Oliver Bowden
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