Crossover of the Week

April 1923

THE HAUNTING OF DREARCLIFF GRANGE SCHOOL 

Drearcliff Grange School student Amy Thomsett, aka the Kentish Glory, and her fellow members of the Moth Club take part in the Great Game, an annual contest of skill between their school and others and must deal with the mysterious ghostly figure known as the Broken Doll. Appearing or mentioned are: Lucinda Tregellis-d’Aulney, aka the Aviatrix; Dr. Shade; Ariadne; Richard Cleaver, aka Clever Dick; the Diogenes Club; Janice Marsh; the Black Sow of Under-London; the Undertaking; Miss Violet “Fossil” Borrodale; Dennis Rattray, aka Blackfist; Maurice Wyvil; Moll Flanders; the Old Jago; Bert Stevens; Enoch Drebber; Lauriston Gardens; Jefferson Hope; Dr. Watson; the Splendid Six; Lord Piltdown; Jennifer God; Lord Leaves; Hans von Hellhund; Number 347, Piccadilly; Geoffrey Jeperson; Count DeVille; “Necro-nommi-con des Mortis”; Valmouth; the Hurstpierpoint Hotel; Sir Wilfrid Teazle; Mark Robarts’ A Counterblast to Agnosticism; Brichester; Colonel Clay; Sophy Kratides; Graustark; “a cove with either too many or too few names”; the Moriarty Mob; Sebastian Moran; Johnny Barlowe; the Opera Ghost Agency; Erik de Boscherville, aka the Phantom; Silver Blaze; Uncle Satt; Thomas Carnacki; the Mausoleum; the Royal North Surrey Regiment; Sir Boris de Bruin; the Department of Supplies; Sally Nikola’s dad; a Rolls-Royce ShadowShark; Colonel Zenf; Mr. John Bronze; the Angel Down Changeling; Queen Tera; the Mystic Maharajah; Lydia Marlowe; Anne Sercombe; Anne D’Arbanvilliers-Cleaver; Cassandra, Heather, and Priscilla Wilding; Thelma Guildmar; Giulietta Nefaria; Vera Claythorne; and Cunegonde Quive-Smith. 

Novel by Kim Newman, Titan Books, 2018. The Splendid Six, consisting of the Aviatrix, Clever Dick, Blackfist, Lord Piltdown, the Blue Streak, and the Mystic Maharajah, are from Newman’s Diogenes Club story “Clubland Heroes.” Hans von Hellhund is also from that story; an AU counterpart is mentioned in “Coastal City.” Dr. Shade is from Newman’s “The Original Dr. Shade.” Ariadne is from Newman’s Bad Dreams. The Diogenes Club and Sophy Kratides are from Doyle and Watson’s Sherlock Holmes story “The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter.” Bert Stevens is from the Holmes story “The Adventure of the Norwood Builder.” Enoch Drebber, Lauriston Gardens, and Jefferson Hope are from Holmes’ first appearance, A Study in Scarlet. Colonel Sebastian Moran is Professor Moriarty’s lieutenant from “The Adventure of the Empty House.” Silver Blaze is from the Holmes tale “The Adventure of Silver Blaze.” The Undertaking is from the Diogenes Club stories “Angel Down, Sussex” and “Sorcerer Conjurer Wizard Witch.” The Angel Down Changeling is from the former story. The Mausoleum is from the latter story. Violet Borrodale is from Newman’s “Richard Riddle, Boy Detective in ‘The Case of the French Spy.’” Janice Marsh, a member of the Marsh family seen in H. P. Lovecraft’s “The Shadow over Innsmouth,” is from Newman’s “The Big Fish” and “Another Fish Story.” The Black Sow of Under-London is the Beast of London from Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere. Maurice Wyvil is from William Harrison Ainsworth’s Old St. Paul's. Moll Flanders is the title character of Daniel Defoe’s novel. The Old Jago is from Arthur Morrison’s A Child of the Jago. “Jennifer God” is a reference to vampire Geneviève Dieudonné from the Diogenes Club stories, who also has a counterpart in the Anno Dracula Universe. Lord Leaves is from the Diogenes Club stories “Soho Golem" and “Cold Snap.” Number 347, Piccadilly was Dracula’s home in London in Bram Stoker’s novel. “Count DeVille” was the alias Dracula used to buy the house. Geoffrey Jeperson is the adoptive father of Richard Jeperson, a 1960s and 1970s agent of the Diogenes Club seen in Newman’s The Man from the Diogenes Club. Richard Jeperson drives a Rolls-Royce ShadowShark. “Necro-nommi-con des Mortis” is a reference to the Necronomicon Ex Mortis from the Evil Dead movies; the book appears under the variant name Necronomicon des Mortes in the Angel episode "Hell Bound." Valmouth is from Ronald Firbank’s novel of the same name. One of the characters in the book is Mrs. Eulalia Hurstpierpoint. Sir Wilfrid Teazle is an ancestor of Louise Magellan Teazle from Newman’s An English Ghost Story. Mark Robarts is from Anthony Trollope’s Framley Parsonage. A Counterblast to Agnosticism is from Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles. Brichester University is from Ramsey Campbell’s Cthulhu Mythos stories. Colonel Clay is from Grant Allen’s An African Millionaire. Graustark is a European kingdom in novels by George Barr McCutcheon. The “cove with either too many or too few names” is the Man with No Name from Sergio Leone’s films dubbed “the Dollars Trilogy”: A Fistful of Dollars, For a Few Dollars More, and The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. Johnny Barlowe is from Ilya Surguchev and Frederick Albert Swan’s The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo. The Opera Ghost Agency is from Newman’s Angels of Music. Erik is from Gaston Leroux’s The Phantom of the Opera. Uncle Satt and Sir Boris de Bruin are from the Diogenes Club story “The Gypsies in the Wood.” Thomas Carnacki is from William Hope Hodgson’s Carnacki, the Ghost-Finder. The Royal North Surrey Regiment is from A. E. W. Mason’s The Four Feathers. The Department of Supplies is from Newman’s Professor Moriarty: The Hound of the d’Urbervilles. Sally Nikola’s father is Guy Boothby’s villain Dr. Nikola. Colonel Zenf is from “Sorcerer Conjurer Wizard Witch” and “Cold Snap.” John Bronze is from Newman’s contributions to The Lovecraft Squad mosaic novel series, created by Stephen Jones. Queen Tera is from Stoker’s The Jewel of Seven Stars. Lydia Marlowe is from the Sherlock Holmes movie The Woman in Green. Anne (or Ann) Sercombe is the future wife of John le Carré’s spy George Smiley. Anne D’Arbanvilliers-Cleaver may be the sister of Clever Dick, whose aunt, Rebecca D’Arbanvilliers-Cleaver, appears in “The Gypsies in the Wood.” Cassandra, Heather, and Priscilla Wilding are likely related to Newman’s recurring character Heather Wilding. Thelma Guildmar is from the 1922 movie Thelma. Giulietta Nefaria, aka Whitney Frost, is better known as Madame Masque, a foe and onetime love interest of the Marvel Comics hero Iron Man. Vera Claythorne is from Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None. Cunegonde Quive-Smith must be related to Major Quive-Smith from the movie Man Hunt. 

This crossover writeup is one of hundreds included in my book Crossovers Expanded: A Secret Chronology of the World Volume 3, which will be published by Meteor House! All three volumes are AUTHORIZED companions to Win Scott Eckert's Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World Volumes 1 and 2!