Some while ago I wrote a blog explaining some of the influences behind the construction of the Anakim – the species of human I created for my Under the Northern Sky trilogy. The final book, The Cuckoo, has just been released in the US and Canada, which seems as good a time as any to examine some of the other influences.
The books are set in Erebos – an alternate version of Dark Age Europe, in which multiple species of human have survived. Uneasily rubbing shoulders with the Anakim, and the modern humans with which we are familiar, live the Unhieru.
Brilliant, indolent, beautiful and feral, I loved creating them. There’s no spoilers below, but beware, you will find some serious anthropological nerdery.
Some atmospheric art from the highly talented Jago Silver, the Unhieru looming over all
The primary inspiration for the Anakim was (very loosely) the Neanderthal, and in the same way, the spark for the Unhieru was provided by an extinct species of giant ape: Gigantopithecus. Little is known about this, perhaps the largest member of the ape family, as only very partial remains have been recovered. However, from the size of those remains, it appears to have been enormous. Its teeth also suggest a diet adapted to fruits and vegetation, rather than meat, and this gave me the very basic starting points for the Unhieru: giants, who were mostly vegetarian. This has more consequences than you might think.
With only limited meat, you are required to spend an awful lot of the day eating and digesting vegetation in order to extract the necessary calories. Gorillas (mostly vegetarian) feed about 8 hours per day, contrasted with less than 4 hours for modern humans. So we had another essential characteristic: the Unhieru would be – to Anakim eyes – lazy, as they are required to spend so much time eating and digesting.
They still needed to be clever, in order to be worthy adversaries, but this too is a challenge with a diet low in meat. Limited meat requires a big gut to properly extract calories from plant matter, and due to something called the Expensive Tissue Hypothesis, it’s widely supposed that it’s impossible to have a big gut and a big brain in the same body (you just can’t get enough calories to sustain them at the same time). So how could did the Unhieru buck this trend, and develop a big brain?
In humans, this was probably first achieved by incorporating more meat into the diet, until ancient hominins grew intelligent enough to develop fire. This allows you to digest your food outside the body, allowing you a smaller gut, and more energy to be diverted to a larger brain. But the Unhieru, we already know, aren’t adapted to eat much meat, so they needed an alternative to make that first leap towards fire.
Fruit-trees seemed the answer. Small fruits are evolved to attract birds, who can spread the seeds enclosed within, but large fruits (such as apples) appear to have first evolved as a means of attracting the megafauna so prevalent before the end of the Ice Age. The Unhieru are certainly megafauna, and I thought that one way they could have evolved their large brains would be to become specialist frugivores, forming a symbiotic relationship with apple trees. They would prize the best areas for apple trees so highly that they warred over them (much as modern chimpanzees do), eventually learning to nurture the trees, and select the best and most productive ones. And they would grow together, the apples becoming sweeter and denser sources of energy, the Unhieru cleverer.
All this selection, over thousands of years and without cross pollination from other apple species, would probably have unintended consequences too. By the time we meet the Unhieru in The Spider, it is clear they are a failing race. Their trees have become too inbred, and have little defence to parasitic mistletoe, which is slowly choking their way of life.
But they linger on, because they became clever enough to develop that other essential technology: fire. And that gave them the final mental boost required to adopt pastoralism: the way of life that keeps them clinging on, into the world of The Spider.
This last development was inspired by the Odyssey, and it’s description of the giant Cyclopes. They are said to be shepherds, who know nothing of agriculture or metalwork, but are:
Men overweening in pride, who plundered their neighbours continuously…
And:
Neither assemblies for council have they, nor appointed laws, but they dwell on the peaks of lofty mountains in hollow caves
I’ve often wondered if old legends such as these might have their roots in ancient cultural memories of other species of human. This may seem improbable, but cultures are undoubtedly capable of preserving memories for many thousands of years. There are numerous Native American tales which speak of a monstrous animal, featuring a fifth arm between its shoulders, which it could use as dextrously as we use our own, and slept by leaning against trees. These memories are so consistent that they are widely interpreted as a millennia-old recollection of the days when they shared their land with the woolly mammoth.
There are also aborigine tribes in Australia who can name landmarks which have been underwater since a rise in sea levels 13,000 years ago. I find such ancient knowledge utterly compelling, and wonder what other memories might have entered our modern consciousness, masquerading as just stories. Maybe some of them have their origins in something more. So the Unhieru drew from the Cyclopes, becoming semi-parasitic on other humans, never needing to produce their own metal because they found it so easy to take from their neighbours. And besides, they lack the social order to produce such a complex technology.
But just as the Anakim have their iron-rich bone armour, the Unhieru have some unusual characteristics too. One of these is the feeling of dread they are able to command in those nearby. This idea came from some research which suggested infrasound – noises with a frequency too low for human ears to detect – may precipitate untraceable terror, even when it cannot be consciously detected. This struck me particularly when writing The Spider. At the time, I was experiencing some particularly intense and unpleasant anxiety, and found it all too easy to imagine a crippling, nameless dread that seems to come from nowhere.
I thought perhaps it would not be so outlandish to imagine that the Unhieru could produce infrasound of just the right pitch to elicit terror in those nearby. It would certainly be a useful adaptation, and again, it didn’t seem so impossible to me.
Living human beings can do some remarkable things. There is evidence that babies produce signals in their saliva, which are detected by receptors in the mother’s breast during suckling, and enable the milk to be tailored directly to the babies’ needs. Compared to that, making a noise that elicits terror seems relatively straightforward.
It is notable too that the Unhieru have two tiers of males. One is larger, maned, golden-eyed and socially high-ranking. The other is smaller, rangier and brown-eyed. This was inspired by orangutans, which have just such a system of two-tiered males. Only one of them (the rarer, larger ‘flanged male’ with their distinctive broad faces) is attractive to females. The vast majority of male orangutans belong to the other tier of males, who are much smaller, rangier and less appealing.
You may ask how, if the vast majority of male orangutans are unattractive to females they are able to reproduce (then again maybe not, as modern humans seem to struggle with a similar problem). The answer is not pleasant, but the concept of a two-tiered system of males with alternative mating strategies seemed an interesting one to explore. In the case of the Unhieru, it is with material provision that the smaller males are able to win favour with the females: by demonstrating that they can provide enough resources to support offspring (even if this means stealing off the larger males).
Albion at the start of The Cuckoo, with a rendering of an Unhieru helmet bottom left
There’s much more to the Unhieru, and why they are as they are. But perhaps that’s a tale for another time. So if you’ll forgive the gear-shift, the last thing I’ll cover in this post is a return to the Anakim, and one of the features of their society about which I’ve had most questions: The Academy. This is a sisterhood of historians who dedicate their lives to memorising the past, and distilling the lessons from it. I’ve described previously why the Anakim cannot write, and why they would still have needed a formal means of recalling the past. The Academy filled this gap, recalling thousands of historic poems, much as the Iliad and the Odyssey were conveyed orally by the pre-literate Greeks.
But why make it a sisterhood?
When I began studying biological anthropology, one of the first mysteries we encountered was why women evolved such a significant post-reproductive lifespan. After the menopause, women are unable to produce further children, and yet usually go on living for decades. As they are unable to pass on their genes during this time, it is difficult to see how or why this capacity evolved. In fact, such a long post-reproductive lifespan is nearly unheard of in the animal kingdom.
There are many competing answers, but one of the leading ones is the Grandmother Hypothesis, which suggests that post-reproductive women (one of those flattering descriptions so typical of biological anthropology) are still playing a critical role in the survival of their own genes. One famous study of juvenile rhesus monkeys found that those with surviving grandmothers are significantly more likely to survive to adulthood, than those without. A grandmother is still therefore helping perpetuate her genes, even when she is no longer reproducing.
This is likely to be more true for human societies than for rhesus monkeys. In hunter-gatherers, older women contribute a disproportionate amount to group calories (knowing when, where and how to find the best wild foods, having the skills to gather them efficiently, and requiring relatively little of them in return). In a manner familiar to many modern parents, they also provide the extra childcare so critical for highly dependent offspring. It’s therefore easy to see how a surviving grandmother bestows a fine advantage on her grandchildren and their chances of survival, but the Grandmother Hypothesis remains controversial. Critics argue that, as each grandchild only has a quarter of the grandmother’s DNA, this survival advantage would have to be massive in order for it to confer a selective advantage.
However, I think this underappreciates another factor – what we might call the Matriarch Effect. Elephant herds are led by a matriarch, who carries with her memories of past troubles and how the group overcame them. She may remember the one watering hole which does not dry out, even during droughts not witnessed for 50 years, and so preserve her entire herd. The continuity of that knowledge is priceless. In ancient human societies, some of the oldest living people will likely have been women, as they are past the dangerous reproductive years, and less likely to be involved in the risky business of hunting and warfare. To a nomadic hunter-gatherer society, the knowledge they held of past times would have been utterly indispensable.
The Academy is a nod to the Grandmother Hypothesis, and the knowledge of elders that has preserved so many groups in times of need. It is also a reminder as to what these books are ultimately about: exploring some of the underlying truths about human beings. What is inherent, what is learned. We have come so far, and built so much, but some things will not change. This is one of the lessons of the Unhieru. Try as we might, some of our behaviours are a matter of hardware, rather than software. We ignore them at our peril.
The Cold Edge 
Just finished The Cuckoo. I loved this trilogy. I have question though, about the ending. I don’t want to leave any spoilers here. But I have thoughts about it. What made you choose to go the route you did in regards to how the whole story ends?
Delighted you enjoyed! Its difficult to explain what’s behind the ending without spoilers, but I’m planning to write another spoilery post talking about it very soon. Watch this space!
Warm regards
Leo
Is there anyway to talk about it through email then? That way no spoilers are placed on here.
You can drop me a message on Instagram (@leocarew) and I’ll try and answer any Qs!
This was a great trilogy. Congratulations on your success with it. Has anyone approached you about obtaining TV rights to the books? Seems like it would make a great TV series.
Delighted you enjoyed. No luck with the TV rights yet, but I’m a patient man!
Leo
Really enjoyed the series. What an emotional roller coaster! Looking forward to hearing news of what is to come! It was interesting that you didn’t reference the biblical Anakim in the article above. Also Gogmagog, is a possible Bible derivation. Also could be a Welsh giant reference and I note the similarity with the map of Albion with the UK, and the Gogmagog’s Unhieru lands in the west similar to Wales!
I’m so pleased! I spoke about the name of the Anakim a bit in the last article I wrote on the trilogy: https://leocarew.com/2018/04/08/on-the-origin-of-a-species/
There’s quite a few biblical derivations in the world, but the inspiration for Gogmagoc was drawn from Geoffrey of Monmouth’s history of Britain – last of the race of giants, who were the first inhabitants of ‘Albion’. That seemed too intriguing to ignore!
Warm regards,
Leo
I loved reading the books the Wolf and the Cuckoo and even though i read the german translations they we’re still amazing.
You could really feel and See the Battlefield as the Battle was described. One the one Hand i loved the big battles and political intriques but the Relationships were also very interesting especially the one between Roper and Belamus two People from so different cultures Backgrounds and up bringings that respect each other because of their intelligence and strategy on the Battlefield. It also were interesting how those two geniuses could come to such different conclusions when faced with the same dataset, at the end of The Wolf. I am really looking Forward to the end of The trilogy with The Cuckoo, however I was wondering If and when the german translation would be available as I’d Like to read it in my native tongue to properly understand it but the anticipation is so big i will propably buy the english Version to See how the trilogy ends.
Good regards.
Hi Frank,
I’ve heard the German translations are excellent (though unfortunately my German isn’t good enough to confirm). I’m thrilled you enjoyed, and there’s more of the above in The Cuckoo. I’m afraid I’m not sure about a German version at present, which means that if there is one on the way, it would still be quite some time. For now you may have to rely on the English version – I hope it doesn’t disappoint!
Warm regards,
Leo
The first book got me curious and fascinated
The second book got me hooked.
And the third book, well it has been a long time that that a book shifted me through so many different emotions.
You know the feeling that you want to keep on reading so you can get to the end, but at the same time you don’t want the story to end because it’s so good. Well it certainly moved me very much and I sincerely hope that you will write new books.
Kurt
I’m delighted to hear this Kurt! I’ll keep working on new books, at the moment the plan is some historical fiction, probably about the Aztecs. Their story is so fascinating and I think a little under-known given how wild it is.
Thanks again for your kind words.
Warm regards,
Leo
Wauw that is great news, always interested by Aztecs, Maya’s and other native American cultures. I did a tour in the Yucatan peninsula to visit the Maya sites. A great read are the alternative history fiction books by Alan Smale, The Clash of Eagles series. Maybe you allready read them, but if you didn’t I think you should. Looking forward to your Aztec book or books.
Kind regards
Kurt
Frank from above again.
I finally read the Cuckoo and I only have positive words for the book. It was truly amazingly written, the plottwists shocking and intersting, and the battle at the end was glorious. Each time the perspective shifted you got me hooked on their side of the story. I am looking forward to any new book you will write in the future.
Frank
Thank you Frank, I’m so happy it didn’t disappoint!
Hi, my name is Ria Rivera. I tried reaching out through Instagram but the message got cut off.
I wanted to let you know how much I loved your books. (I’ve read The Wolf and The Spider so far.) I’m a soldier myself and going on my first deployment soon. Your books helped a lot through the anxiety of this whole process.
Giants are my favorite mythical being and your use of them has been fantastic! They are so underrated.
I am also an artist and writer, I was wondering if it would alright with you if I drew some scenes and characters from the books that really struck me?
Thank you for your time, I can’t wait to see more from you and your adventures!
Hi Ria
I’m so pleased you enjoyed the books and found them helpful. I’d be delighted for you to draw any scenes you wish – if you wanted then do send them to me, I’d be very pleased to see them!
Good luck with your first deployment, hope it goes smoothly.
Warm regards
Leo
I just finished the Cuckoo, I loved every bit! I was scared and happy throughout. I can’t remember when I was last so enthralled by a series.
I finished something today, I was wondering how you’d like me to send it over along with any others.
-Ria Rivera
I’ll send them to you through drive links
Hope you like them! I had a lot of fun making them, Garret and Book 3 Viktir is my favorite (sorry if I misspelled some names, I own the audio book versions.)
“The sons of Kynortis” https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cE6BRxtSN6Hr5I-NwPnrSDU7UKUPseyM/view?usp=drivesdk
These are some headshot doodles of the characters as I imagined them. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1c1OmpYY_AmHKFQYWYkcqTdBLQI9co3HZ/view?usp=drivesdk
My friend who’s also reading the books and I are currently deciding which scene to adapt to short comic form too, so hopefully I can get to that some time within my life time lol.
These are excellent Ria, thanks so much for sharing them! I’m always absolutely delighted to see other people’s interpretations of this world. My personal favourite is the development of Bellamus from Books 1 – 3 (and Garrett is terrifying!)
Warm regards,
Leo
Thank you! Feel free to do with them as you wish. I’m re listening to book one, I’m thinking of drawing Takoa next. When I get old and stop giving a care I wanna be just like him! Man kills me!
I had a lot of fun with Bellamus, particularly making his features that “soft” that Roper describes then as when they first meet. I could never fully see him as a villain until around the middle/end of Book three. Then I took heavy inspiration from Odin from God of War Ragnarok.
The Hybrids have a special charm to me, I don’t know, I think I just emmpathize with the feeling of coming from two completely different places, and feeling like you don’t belong anywhere. My heart broke when the parallels between Bellamus and Garrett ended the way they did.
Let me know if there’s other characters you’d like to see me draw if there’s any.
-Ria Rivera
Just finished all 3 books in less than a month after not reading anything captivating for years. Can honestly say I have never been this drawn in by a series, I couldn’t stop reading but also didn’t want it to end. The last 100 pages or so were a pure whirlwind of emotions. Looking forward to anything else that you may have planned!
– Josh
That’s what I like to hear Josh! I’m thrilled you enjoyed, thank you very much for your kind words.
Warm regards,
Leo
Happy new Year!
I hope all’s going well, I’m on my second listen through of the series and I’ve realized these characters are quickly swallowing up my sketchbook pages lol.
I’m sorry if I spelled some of their names wrong (but since most of the characters are illiterate, at least they can’t be offended with me.)
https://drive.google.com/file/d/11JKMY_4CQnSR6MnQtKebb3NtDe3gl4lA/view?usp=drivesdk
Legate Tekoa demanded special attention,Of course!
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1k7IOtjbUQKJI1VKKzT2Y8hqLZzX9W__L/view?usp=drivesdk
And a pair of brother portraits I did with the two boys. (The little fox thing (me) is an enfield (a bird fox creature from Irish folklore.) I’m not very confident with self portraits.)
https://drive.google.com/file/d/10IxVzEVYCHVUUQfCW53IMG4OfJFlEQ5a/view?usp=drivesdk
https://drive.google.com/file/d/119aaiO1l12NO0fjYAb9TPmk4s6-JNbEp/view?usp=drivesdk
-Sincearly
Ria Rivera
Happy New Year! That is an excellent point regarding the illiteracy of the characters, I’m sure they wouldn’t have understood the concept of correct spelling at all.
Thank you for sharing these! Splendid attention to detail. I’m a particular fan of the Legate Tekoa page – like how he’d be introduced in a graphic novel. Also it looks as though Bellamus has taken up residence in Roper’s old room…
Warm regards,
Leo
Probably not lol. Right sounds, wrong letters? They might think we just love making things more complicated than they need to be.
Funny you should say that, I’ve settled on House Vidaa as the chapter to adapt into a short comic. It’s my favorite! It’ll take me a little while to get it scripted and then drawn but I’ll be happy to send you the files with the pages once it’s done!
Roper won’t mind I’m sure haha! He was probably so eager to get outside and be free from the torture of being still for his portrait. Maybe didn’t notice Bellamus sneaking in for his turn. (I wanted to add the cave bear he does have but Bellamus already wore the fur and I felt it would’ve over charged the portrait with browns.)
Hello!
As you know I’m making House Vida into a comic, but as it’s a dense chapter it’ll take me a while and I’ve been having a little trouble with the translation of text to panel. So I made this for fun! I hope you enjoy watching as much as I enjoyed making it. (Posted it on YouTube as well, I hope that’s okay.)
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1gCb4qSMzYk4PX1Nv7RvtSKFIIPVqm1Ag/view?usp=drivesdk
Sincerely
-Ria Rivera
This has been living rent free in my head for weeks,
Roper was formerly in the front until we needed someone to keep the peace between the Viddaa. Grey doesn’t like having the radio on so got a long road trip of Tekoa backseat driving and Pryce’s road rage 😂
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ssQ8t6v0EL8I86XY1NXecXkUyxNeG_X4/view?usp=drivesdk
(By the way, let me know if there’s an email or another chat you’d like me to send these to or something, I wouldn’t want this to get too over crowded or cumbersome or risk of spoilers.)
-Sincearly
Ria Rivera
There are no words to describe how much I enjoyed this series. I am an obsessive and over the top REH and CONAN fan and to come across a story that blazes across the pages such as this series does is very…I repeat…very rare. The adventure and scope of this world demands that we reach for the horizon but also ask if we should leap over the threshold of the unknown with little thought of the consequences. Great reading. The characters grab you by the throat, pull you in the deep end of the pool and hold you down until the very last moment only to let you up soaking wet and gasping for air. There is so much generic fantasy available today, both High and Low. Dragons, Elves and other pixie dust related ensembles get old, but this series picks up the charge and leads the reader forward.
Joseph I’m so pleased to receive your message, it sounds as though you really grasped what I was trying to convey. Particularly the drive to see on the other side of the horizon, balanced with the fear that perhaps the horizon is in that location for a reason, which haunts me as an idea. I’m so pleased you enjoyed, and took the time to write. Thank you very much for your kind words.
Warm regards
Leo
Hey Mr. Carew,
I don’t know if you’ll see this, as many of these messages are from last year, but when I read your ‘about the author’ on The Cuckoo, it struck me that I really want to be like you, be it exploring, or studying medicine. I hadn’t really found a good fantasy book here in the States but when I saw The Wolf, tucked in a shelf in my local library, I decided to give it a try(I had gotten quite bored reading Jules Verne), and the book completely blew my thoughts of a fantasy book out of the water, and that’s when I realized this book was so much more than that. Seeing Roper develop throughout these three books is something I haven’t seen in a single book series I have ever read. Thank you for changing my life.
P.S. WHEN IS YOUR NEXT BOOK?! I’ve been dying to hear something about it.
The best,
Abhimanyu
Abhimanyu – thank you very much for your comment, and sorry for taking a while to reply! I’ve been off grid for some time. I love that the books meant something to you, and particularly Roper’s development, which felt very important in the writing.
I’m working on a few different projects at the moment, including something autobiographical, but the next book will be historical fiction about the Aztecs. The medicine is keeping me busy and slowing me down a little, but we’ll get there before too long!
Warm regards,
Leo
*SPOILERS*
Hi Leo,
First and foremost, thank you for writing this trilogy. I recently finished and I find it so difficult to pick up a new book. Given how incredibly emotionally invested I am in the lives of fictional, yet grounded, flawed and inspirational characters like Roper, Gray, Ormur, Pryce, and Leon (not to take away anything from the other incredible characters), I found myself wanting some closure to cope with the ending of the Cuckoo. I tried to read and watch any more possible content I could find on this trilogy only to be led here to your blog website. Let this comment be an appreciation, eulogy and my raw feelings on the trilogy in hopes I can connect with anyone that reads this.
*LAST SPOILER WARNING*
The journey of Anakim was nothing short of glorious, beautiful and tragic. A people which such a rich way of life from their appreciation to nature, to their unbreakable will and resolve to the very end. With the foreshadowing you planted throughout the books to prepare the reader for the ending (*cough* Roper’s and Bellamus’s chess games *cough*), I saw there was only one of two ways the Anakim were going to make it out of this series. And god damn it! I really wanted them to win. Them having the core values that I related to the most, I rooted for them in every turn, mainly because I didn’t want such a beautiful people to be annihilated. And then the Unhieru backstabbed the Anakim unable to see the intellectual treachery Belamus planned for them. I was yelling at them with Roper as he was being dragged away. Even though I disagreed with Gogmagoc, I understood his frustration in the end though it didn’t justify turning their backs on their partnership. I wanted Roper to see his son and be part of his upbringing. I wanted Ormur to be the awesome uncle he would have been. In a another world, I wanted these doomed characters to feel peace and not be burdened by extinction and have their work rewarded, but as you said in an interview, “sometimes you can do your best and still fail”. I had to shift my perspective and reflect that the Anakim winning the war was never the ultimate objective. The ultimate objective was to show and be that unbreakable resolve and strength that each Anakim hold in their hearts from their upbringing; To be a force to be reckoned, that they’re bodies might break but their soul never will, left me in tears. Bellamus got what he wanted in the end, victory but a lonely, empty one. If only he was in power earlier, with Roper and him managing a truce, maybe we would have never needed to see a final war since both men were fighting each other at the fear the other won’t stop until they finished the other off. In end the Anakim do survive, which was a relief and I will never forget these characters that meant so much to me, that I wished they were real. RIP.
Great trilogy! Love the anthropological inspirations, I will be on the constant look out for any of your future books. Thank you for having a blog website and allowing me a medium to share my thoughts in hopes to connect with you. I wish you success in all your endeavors.
Warm regards,
Roman
Dear Roman,
I was so pleased to read your comment – it really feels as though you understood and appreciated so much of what I was trying to convey in the books. Especially the ‘Anakim mindset’ – that we don’t always get the ending our endeavours deserve, but the important thing is to know that may happen and to try anyway. And the foreshadowing too, well spotted with the chess game!
I wrote the books partly to lay the characters to rest and get them out of my head, as they’d taken up residence in there. Unfortunately it doesn’t seem to have done the job, as they keep popping up. It may force me to revisit Erebos at some point.
Thanks again for your message.
Warm regards,
Leo
Good evening,
I’ve started an Instagram for fanart I make and have made for this series, I don’t know why I didn’t do it sooner to be honest.
Foxtrot_hollow if any readers are interested in seeing it too. Hope you enjoy it ❤️
Respectfully
-Ria Rivera