Rick Rawes

By eck, we get around a bit, don’t we? This week’s blog post is all about a quick introduction to the thinking behind the universe. Not the real one, my one – and some of the inspiration I’ve drawn upon to craft it. Very mild spoilers ahead (nothing world-ending) but I thought I would forewarn. This is a little journey, into the where’s and wherefores of these novels and why we got there.

So, with our satchels packed (hopefully with a nice lunch) let us don our sunglasses and step foot onto the road. This first place may seem a little familiar to you. Well, some of you.

Earth

So, welcome to Earth. The main realm. The middle bit of the whole universe. Not because other planets in other far flung corners of the galaxy don’t have every right to be the centre of the universe, it’s just as a writer we’re taught to at least start where you know. And I’ve been around on Earth for going on thirty-odd years by now (shush, not forty yet). And so, we start here.

That’s not to say Earth is a particularly boring place. It’s large, it’s been around about 4 billion years and is host to a whole bunch of beings. Some supernatural, some technological, and some plain annoying. You’ll notice many of the stories are set around Manchester – for two reasons. The city itself is very near and dear to my heart, being the closest city when growing up, so responsible for many fond memories, and also where I did my time in university. Also, where I had my first dodgy kebab coming out of a chip shop at three in the morning after a night on Canal Street. But hey, at least I didn’t eat pizza off the floor of the bus like one of my peers.

The second reason Manchester is the focus is because I kind of want to see a bit more North in contemporary fiction. Don’t get me wrong, award winning books and movies have been set in the north of England. But as much as Full Monty and Chicken Run may have dominated the cultural zeitgeist, where were the dragons? Where were the car chases down Canal Street or a super-powered bust up in Picadilly Gardens? Where were the places I could recognise?

Yes, the Eifel tower might be impressive and all, but there’s something undeniably attractive about the idea of a unicorn fight out the front of a Greggs you’ve frequented.

I generally go with a rule of thumb. Most real places featured in the books – Santorini, Malta, Liverpool, Manchester, London – are places which I’ve been to. I’ve walked those streets, I’ve experienced those places and I’ve added them into my books. Where I haven’t, I may tend to make fictionalised versions. For example, in the upcoming Sinners & Saints we visit the Central American nation of Manantiala and the sand-strewn deserts of Kitbhutan. But largely, by and by, if you visit a place in one of my books, it’s because I’ve been there for you – and want you to have that same feeling of – wow, I recognise that.

In upcoming novels there’s plenty of new places too, because I always love to travel and who wants to stay in one place anyway? So, there’s a touch of Egypt (readers of Bastet might be able to figure out why), perhaps a somewhat autobiographical move to Leeds for some, and a whole new novel set in Sheffield. Exciting times.

Anyway, that’s earthbound. But as a certain young man says in an iconic 80s sci-fi horror western crazy novel, there’s other worlds than these – so let’s move on.

The OtherWorld

Perhaps one of the closest realms to Earth is the OtherWorld. Now in early British mythology (before there were stricter borders such as England, Wales, Scotland) there was the concept of the OtherWorld. An idea of a place where all manner of magickal creatures lived. A world that lay alongside our own in a way that felt like a thin layer of gossamer paper over an image you could almost just see underneath. Here there were monsters, there were faerie folk, and dragons and unicorns and all manner of things.

When I first starting writing Avalon, the OtherWorld became the catch-all for so many of these beings. A realm, just next door, perhaps overlayed with our own, in which all manner of creatures lived. Though we haven’t been there in person (yet), it is a rich and textured world, overlayed with it’s own rules and hierarchies and social strata. You just have to listen to the way Linda speaks with derision about the Earth Elementals to get it’s not all rainbows and puppies (apparently, they smell like wet dog).

The principle established here though, is the idea of layering. The universe is layered. Now don’t ask me to explain the physics behind it, but somewhere in the quarks and quasars of multidimensional thinking, there’s ideas about other worlds. Places that exist alongside our own along boundaries and borders that are somehow unseen to us. This is not a new concept, this is simply something I’ve woven in.

The OtherWorld is exactly that – other. It is overlayed with our own, vibrating at a similar frequency if you like. I suppose you could also argue that it is not necessarily a bad place. It is different. It is a place where there are monsters, and there are good folk. Morally balanced, if strange and different. And some day – one we’ll visit. But for now, let’s move away from morally balanced – and perhaps speculate on something a little darker.

UnderWorlds: Anwnn

A little further down the Spiral there are the Underworlds. These are worlds still laid over our own in some multidimensional physics kind of a way, but these realms are not quite so morally balanced. These are places where the souls reside, the places of death and darkness. One such hell dimensional prison is about to feature prominently in the upcoming ‘til the End of the World series, but perhaps so far, the most well-fleshed of them all is Anwnn.

Anwnn in Welsh mythology is a dark underworld ruled over by King Arawn. A place of punishment and pain. But when I heard about it (I think I was listening to a podcast at the time) an image struck me. A long beach, without end, the walls too steep to climb on one side, tumultuous waves on the other. The sun cold in the sky, the world desaturated and grey and dull. This image came to me so strongly, and stuck around so fiercely, it became the first visual other world we ever went to – as anyone who’s read Avalon: Faerie Tales will know.

Because each of these realms lie in their own little pocket dimensions, tucked away in the folds of our world a bit further down, Anwnn will not be the last under world we will visit. In fact, any you can think of – Tartarus, hades, Duat – they’re all there somewhere in the universe. Some of them perhaps closer than we know.

And now we’ve seen the darkness out there in the universe, what about that within ourselves? Let’s journey inwards.

The ThoughtScape

The last major realm featured prominently in the novels so far is the ThoughtScape. Imagine yourself eating a burger at the age of three. Now image a crow flies into the window of where you are, tells you that your burger is free of relish and produces a small bottle of the condiment for use. Now that thought exists, in your mind’s eye. As surreal and bonkers as it is. So where does it go when it leaves you?

That’s the idea behind the ThoughtScape, majorly featured in Insomniac. It is less of a physical place and more of a metaphysical plane of existence. The dumping ground for all errant though that exists in sentient beings. A place of wonders – where you are able to endlessly dance at your wedding with loved ones who’ve passed on. But also, a place of nightmares – where our darkest impulses and thoughts are given terrible form. A place of thought.

It arose from a simple premise – and probably not a particularly original one. As a writer I make worlds. What happened to those worlds when they were on the pages? What if, by thinking about them, I made them real. Somehow, somewhere? What if my dreams were real in a way I couldn’t reach? And the more I learn about the way our universe works, the blurry line between conscious thought and objective reality, the more I begin to wonder if there isn’t a little something more to the idea.

Perhaps a little Dark Half, perhaps a little shaped by the idea of tulpas – the ThoughtScape is one of those places that’s a little hard to get out of your mind. And so, it will make a return, perhaps in some unexpected ways. Which, speaking of, you may want to stop listening to Boney M. Just sayin’.

Home Again

We’ve journeyed a distance even if those few places – and maybe not necessarily in miles but certainly in thought. A grand plan, a map of the universe, with a few places laid out for you. If these places seem like ones you want to visit, all the books are available with more to come.

But I suppose the last thought I’ll leave you with is this. A lot of the places I’ve been to, and a lot of the places I haven’t. Imagination is the key which bridges those two things – and all of us have imaginations of our own to tap into and play around with. Go visit other places, even if you can’t in body – do so in mind. That’s one thing we should all do more of, whether we commit it to paper or not.

And to the writers of the world out there, if you’re going to write about this world, maybe take a look at the other places you can go. Don’t get me wrong, I love London. As a UK based author, so much I see takes place in London. But maybe don that cap, grab that satchel and stick on those (incredibly optimistic) sunglasses and travel.

Head North, come to see us up in Manchester. Or maybe bob over to Leeds, or to Liverpool (sorry to readers of Fire & Water, I promise it’s still there!), or maybe even to Sheffield. Head further up to Scotland and see the majestic mountains or take a trip out to the beautiful valleys of Wales. Hop across the pond to Belfast and see what’s over there.

Because, as much as I love other worlds, when it comes to writing and reading about this one – there’s life beyond the Thames. There’s other worlds, right here. Come explore them too.

Rick Rawes
Leeds, West Yorkshire
24^th April 2026