| World Of Tiers |
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| science fiction book series | |
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The overall series title comes from the main ' Pocket Universe ' featured in the books. This consists of a single planet with a green sky, shaped in the form of a huge stepped pyramid on five stages, with each stage being a disk or squat cylinder. A small sun and a single moon orbit around this planet. There are no other stars or astronomical bodies. This world was created by a Lord named Jadawin. The overall storyline of the series follows the adventures of two people from Earth who independently discover gates into the World of Tiers. The earlier books focus on the character of Robert Wolff as he explores this world and tries to discover its secrets. From the third book onwards the action shifts to Paul Janus Finnegan (known as ''Kickaha'', along with many other aliases), who is drawn into a battle between an ancient enemy of the Thoans, and ultimately into the feuds between rival Thoans as they try to take over each other's universes. It should also be noted that a roleplaying game inspired by the World of Tiers has been edited in French. NOVELS The novels in the series are:
The novel ''Red Orc's Rage'' (1991) can be included in the series, but the connection is marginal rather than central. Although the main characters from the other books do not occur directly, this novel provides some background material on events and characters in the other novels. SETTING The broad setting of the novels is a series of artificially-constructed universes. The majority of the stories take place on the world created by the Lord Jadawin. This planet consists of a series of cylindrical layers stacked one atop the other, to form an enormous, approximately conical tower. The top surfaces (levels or tiers) of each cylindrical monolith are densely inhabited, while the vertical sides of the monoliths (30-100,000 feet high, called Thayaphaeawoed, Abharhploonta, Doozvillnavava, and Idaquizzoorhruz) act as enormous cliffs which partially isolate the inhabitants of each tier from each other. These cliffs do provide some purchase for climbing, and many specialised creatures live on the cliff surfaces, so this isolation is not complete. There is no diminuation of atmosphere from one level to the next, due to Jadawin's manipulation of the local gravitational fields. The top surfaces of each stage are populated with plants and animals creating different environments. Some of these were abducted from Earth throughout history, while many were created in Jadawin's biolabs. Many creatures have bodies created by Jadawin to replicate mythological creatures (e.g. merpeople, centaurs) implanted with the minds of abducted humans. The tiers are (bottom to top, largest to smallest):
"the surface area on all the levels of this planet, that is, the horizontal area on the tops of the monoliths, equaled the surface area of the watery bodies of Earth. This made the land area more than that of Earth's. In addition, the habitable areas on the verticalities of the monoliths were considerable. These alone probably equaled the land area of Earth's Africa. Moreover, there were immense subterranean territories, great caverns in vast networks that ran under the earth everywhere." REFERENCES The Jadawin family (or at least their names) are taken from William Blake's Mythology . This mythology is referred to by the characters in the stories (mainly in the 2nd & 3rd books). The novels are at least in part a vehicle to represent Mythological character Archetypes . Robert Wolff is a Heroic character who primarily overcomes obstacles by using strength (physical and mental) to confront the Thoans. By contrast, the character of Kickaha is a Trickster , who avoids the affairs of the god-like Thoans wherever possible, and who survives and defeats his enemies by cunning, trickery and skill. The central concept of the series is the existence of arrogant beings who possess awesome powers (as a result of technology) and use these powers to play the role of gods. They are able to travel from place to place almost instantaneously by using gates to teleport from one location or universe to another. This is extremely similar to several central concepts in the fictitious Stargate universe, although there is currently no suggestion that Stargate copied these ideas from the World of Tiers stories. EXTERNAL LINK
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