Illustration
The AI really outdid itself for this chapter, providing me with at least twenty usable illustrations. My husband chose this one; I think he has more artistic taste than I do.

Quote
From the 1954 gospel song, "In My Father's House", by Aileen Hanks. Best known from the version recorded by Elvis Presley in 1960. The lyrics are inspired by John 14:2 in the King James Bible, where it says, "In my father's house there are many mansions."

Mansions in this context simply means "rooms", and some modern translations say something like, "In my father's house there are enough rooms for everybody". However, the song speaks of a "mansion" in a "bright city", which seemed very apt for this chapter.

https://youtu.be/g9PAxe5U9r0

The Rose and Star
When Noel takes Julian to his hotel for the night, since they have missed the bus back to The Wayfarers Arms, Julian is stunned to see it is an elegant luxury hotel. This is taken directly from Defending Your Life, where Daniel is put up at a standard motel, and is dismayed to find Julia is at a swanky hotel.

The implication is the same here – those at the fancy hotel are destined to go on to a higher plane, while the people at the average accommodation are going elsewhere. However, I gave Julian a charming country inn rather than a cheap motel room. Most readers said they would prefer Julian's accommodation to Noel's.

The hotel's name is obviously taken from the rose garden in the centre of Mandela Park; the hotel's crest even shows a white rose and a silver star. Roses and stars are a recurring motif in the story, representing universal love and light. The Rose and Star uses the colours blue, white and silver in its decorations -  traditional colours of the sky and therefore heaven.

I based the décor of The Rose and Star on that of a number of classic luxury hotels in London. Noel's penthouse suite is specifically based on The Royal Suite at Claridge's in Mayfair. It's where Mr and Mrs Middleton stayed for the royal wedding of their daughter Catherine to Prince William, and it costs more than ₤8000 a night.

Cornflowers
Margaret' favourite flowers. Noel orders a vase of them to be sent up to her every morning, as the hotel suites have white roses and lilies instead (symbols of purity, often used as funeral flowers). Of course, Margaret could always order the cornflowers herself, but that would not be nearly so special as receiving them as a gift. As Margaret is dressed in blue, cornflower blue may very well be her favourite colour.

Cornflowers were originally weeds which grew in wheat fields – a suitably humble and rural flower for Margaret to have as her favourite. Also known as Bachelor's Buttons, cornflowers are traditionally known as a symbol for those seeking love, and are commonly used in wedding bouquets. In France, they are used to commemorate the war dead on Remembrance Day, just as poppies are in Britain. My head canon is that Margaret lost her husband in the First World War when she would have been in her twenties, and stayed faithful to his memory.

Suite 3
Noel has the third penthouse suite on the floor. As with Julian's room, which I came up with adding up all the letters in his name, Noel's room number is just the sum of his birth date – he was born on the 21st. Three is therefore Noel's birth number.

In numerology, the number 3 is considered a lucky one, being under the influence of the planet Jupiter. People born with the number 3 have a youthful, upbeat energy, thrive on a rich social life, and embrace unique thinking and artistic expression. Charming and slightly naïve, they are natural optimists.

The tarot card for number 3 is The Empress, representing abundance, luxury, beauty, and an enjoyment of the physical world. Ruled by the planet Venus, it's a card of love, sensuality and sexual pleasure. It seemed very suitable for Noel's room, as it can literally stand for a luxury hotel.

Boosh Reality Check
When Julian hears that Noel doesn't care about luxury, he only wants to be with Julian, Julian thinks, You can't be real. Noel says in response, "I am though. I'm as real as you are".

This is inspired by the episode "Hitcher" in The Mighty Boosh, when Bryan Ferry, played by Julian Barratt, says of the title villain (played by Noel Fielding), "Others say he is a man pretending to be a devil with green make-up and special lighting. But that is nonsense. He is as real as this forest." Bryan/Julian touches a tree for emphasis, upon which that part of the set promptly falls down. 

When Julian meets Noel's housekeeper Sophia, he says that she's so gorgeous, she must have been a Venezuelan beauty queen on Earth. This is a reference to the stage show where the shaman Tony Harrison, a pink octopus creature played by Noel Fielding, claims to be married to a Venezuelan beauty queen (apparently it didn't work out). Venezuela has won more awards at major international beauty pageants than any other country. 

Characters
Bobby
The concierge at The Rose and Star; he was mentioned in Chapter 5 as suggesting Noel might like to play football near Julian's hotel. This seems as if he and Colin may have been scheming to get Julian and Noel together. Bobby is based on the character of the same name from the "Bollo" episode of The Mighty Boosh. He is one of the Grim Reapers who work for the taxi company, has no lines, and is uncredited. I made Bobby blond and handsome because The Rose and Star gets the best of everything, and pictured him as looking rather like David Bowie.

Monty Flange
The lift operator at The Rose and Star. He is based on Monty Flange from the episode "The Chokes" in The Mighty Boosh TV show, played by Noel Fielding. He is an elderly and slyly lascivious acting coach who trains Howard/Julian to be a brilliant actor by questionable means, mostly involving Howard skipping about the woods in his underwear and a pair of tights. Note that the film Withnail and I has a somewhat rapey Uncle Monty, an elderly actor, played by Richard Griffith.

Mrs Margaret Atkins
A very old lady at The Rose and Star that Noel has befriended, who seems as if she might be almost a hundred years old (born in the 1890s). She has a penthouse suite, is dressed in silk, and says she feels as if she has been treated like a queen ever since reaching the Waystation. Margaret is inspired by The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis, where an ordinary working class woman from the East End of London named Sarah Smith is celebrated as if she is a queen of Heaven, due to her warm, kind, and loving nature. Margaret is an original character, but the name Margaret is used routinely in The Mighty Boosh as a running gag. I gave her the surname Atkins because Thomas Atkins is the term for a common soldier in the British Army.

Sophia
Noel's housekeeper at The Rose and Star; more beautiful and glamorous than her counterpart Pauline, but just as polite and efficient at her job (and filled with that gently teasing Waystation attitude!). Sophia is an original character, and her name means "wisdom", to suggest Divine Wisdom, identified as the Holy Spirit in Christianity, the Mother of God in Orthodox tradition, or the soul in Gnosticism. But as Between Life and Death is a philosophical novel, Sophia is also a reference to philosophy (loving wisdom). Noel tells Julian that on Earth, Sophia had been part of a team working on a particle accelerator, so she worked at a nuclear physics facility (Noel thinks it means she worked in a car factory). I did have a look to see if this back story was even slightly credible – there has been a team working on such a project at the Los Alamos National Laboratory  in New Mexico (where they did the Manhattan Project) since the early 1970s. 25% of staff in the early years were female, and 13% were Hispanic. If Sophia was one of them, she might have passed on twenty years or so previously. It seemed suitable that Sophia had been helping to understand the secrets of the Universe while on Earth.