Wildthyme Beyond! (novel)

Wildthyme Beyond was a novel written by Paul Magrs which was a sequel to Enter Wildthyme. Like other Snowbooks Ltd books featuring Iris Wildthyme, it contained no Iris Wildthyme series branding.

Wildthyme Beyond! introduced very few new connections between Iris Wildthyme and Magrs' other work, instead concluding plot threads which began in Enter Wildthyme. Like the previous novel, Wildthyme Beyond! features the characters Simon and Kelly, who both originated from Magrs' novel Exchange.

Publisher's summary
In this volume: Iris and her various friends are stranded on the perplexing and magical world of Hyspero. Ruled over by the all-knowing and all-powerful Scarlet Empress, this is a place where seemingly anything can happen. As Iris and her faithful companion, Panda, are drawn into a nightmarish subterranean adventure, their friends are captured by the guards of the Empress herself for nefarious reasons of her own. Iris descends into memories of her bizarre childhood in a universe far from here... a dreadful place that the despicable poet Anthony Marvelle is trying to unleash, convinced that great riches lie in that mythical region known only as the Obverse...

Friends old and new are along for the ride — including Barbra the brave vending machine, Jenny the ex-traffic warden and Kelly, the Goth girl from the bookshop who discovers she has a strange destiny as the mystical key to unlocking the dimensions. Hyspero itself awakens memories inside her... of a magical book she once read as a child... or, perhaps a book in which she once had her own adventures...

And meanwhile on Earth — two or three dimensions to the left, in the realm of fictionality — Iris's fans and fanfic writers are gathering and quibbling at the curious turn the lady's adventures are taking...

Characters

 * Iris Wildthyme/Lilith
 * Panda
 * Kelly
 * Simon
 * Anthony Marvelle
 * Jenny Winterleaf
 * Barbra
 * Dick
 * Sammy
 * Terry Kelly
 * Eliot
 * Fenster
 * Hope
 * Faith
 * Susan
 * Mary
 * Magda
 * Missy
 * Euphemia
 * The Scarlet Empress

Worldbuilding

 * Saga City is the capitol of the Clockworks in the Obverse.
 * Wherewithal House was the house that Iris grew up in.
 * There is a Greggs in Darlington.
 * The Ringpull is a cosmic phenomenon that separates the universe from the Obverse.
 * Terry has written tie-in novels for Menswear and once met Lance Randall and Karla Sorenson during a visit to the show's set in Manchester.

Continuity

 * Iris recalls Panda once being in the possession of Tom. (AUDIO: Wildthyme at Large)

Audiobook
This novel was released as an digital-only audiobook on 16 March 2023 complete and unabridged as part of the Iris Wildthyme and Friends series by Big Finish Productions and read by Katy Manning.