On November 3, 2018, I posted a first excerpt from a book I would like to write about Master Raymond in my blog entry titled, “Days of the Dead”:
Social Media Hashtags: #DailyLines, #Prologue, #MasterRaymondsBook, #NOitisntwrittenyet, #HappyHALLOWEEN
In the chilly season, when the air grows cold and the spiders die, comes a thin time. The days are short, so all the light of them is concentrated, squeezed between the dawn and dark. This is why the light is different, and each thing has a Shadow. This is when the other worlds draw close, and the barriers between grow thin. In a thin time, they say, you must be careful, because you might walk through a cobweb unthinking, and find yourself Elsewhere.
There is more than one other world; no one knows how many. Some beasts can see one; the dogs will sometimes stare at a blank space on the wall of a cave, and their hackles rise at what they see.
Sometimes, I think I see it, too.
[End Excerpt]
A Book… or Books? … About Master Raymond?
In my Character FAQs page, written in about 2011 or so, I wrote a bit about who Master Raymond is, and his story…
Who/What is Master Raymond? What is his significance? (CONTAINS SPOILERS)
Well, he’s a prehistoric time traveler. I think he came from somewhere about 400 BC or perhaps a bit earlier (not technically “prehistoric,” but they certainly weren’t using written records where he started out), and the 18th century is not his first stop.
He is—or was—a shaman, born with the ability to heal through empathy. He sees auras plainly; those with his power all have the blue light he has—born warriors, on the other hand, are red (so yes, “the red man” is iconic). He has a rather strong aversion to Vikings, owing to events that happened in his own time; hence his nervousness when he sees Jamie. He’s afraid of them, but he also realizes just what a strong life-force they have–that’s why he makes Claire invoke it (using the sexual and emotional link between her and Jamie) to heal her.
His descendants—a few of whom he meets now and then in his travels—have the blue light about them, too; in large degree or small, depending on their talents. So he knows Claire, when he sees her, as one of his great-great, etc. grand-daughters. And Gillian/Geillis is another—you notice she has Claire’s sense of plants, though she tends naturally to poison, rather than medicines.
We’ll see him again—though not in Jamie and Claire’s story, I don’t think. Master Raymond should get his own series of books, eventually. So in fact, we’ll see Claire, Jamie, and Geillis again, then— but as secondary characters in Master Raymond’s story (you recall, Geillis mentions having met “one other” (time-traveler) in VOYAGER, but doesn’t tell Claire who it is).
Heaven knows just when we’ll get to that—in about ten years, at this rate—but we will get to it. <grin>
No, it isn’t written yet. <g> See hashtag above.
“Days of the Dead,” my blog entry from November 3, 2018.
Also see my “Samhain” blog entry from 2010.
My Webmistress and I wish to thank reader Diana Rook for asking about Master Raymond, which spurred the creation of this page on May 4, 2025!
This page was last updated on Sunday, May 4, 2025 at 7:40 a.m. (Central Time) by me, Diana Gabaldon, or my Webmistress, Loretta.