Crossover Cover: Case with 4 Clowns

 

Sergeant Beef and his biographer Townsend are called by Beef’s nephew to the circus where he works to investigate a Romany fortune teller’s prediction someone will be murdered there. The circus’ jack-of-all-trades, Len Waterman, accuses Townsend of making Beef look bad in his books, saying that other detective story writers don’t report their investigators’ failures: “You can’t tell me that that there Lord Simon Plimsoll don’t ever make a mistake.” Artist Cora Frances wonders if Beef knows her friend, Amer Picon. Beef says Picon was involved in one of his cases. He later says to Townsend that Lord Simon Plimsoll, Mr. Philo Vance, or Dr. Thorndyke couldn’t have guessed the murder victim would show up in the ring despite being ill, and rhetorically asks if Sherlock Holmes prevented the murders that he had to find out about. Dorothy L. Sayers’ detective Lord Peter Wimsey appeared in the first Sergeant Beef novel, Case for Three Detectives, under the alias “Lord Simon Plimsoll,” and Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot as “Amer Picon.” S. S. Van Dine’s detective Philo Vance and R. Austin Freeman’s sleuth Dr. Thorndyke are solidly in the CU. Sherlock Holmes needs no introduction.

This crossover is one of over a thousand covered in my book Crossovers Expanded: A Secret Chronology of the World Volume 3, coming this summer from Meteor House! All three volumes are AUTHORIZED companions to Win Scott Eckert's Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World Volumes 1 and 2!

Crossover Cover: Case for Three Detectives

 

Are you a fan of Golden Age detective fiction?

Then you'll love the first Sgt. Beef novel by Leo Bruce, which has appearances by thinly veiled versions of Lord Peter Wimsey, Hercule Poirot, and Father Brown!

For more information, be sure to pick up a copy of my book Crossovers Expanded: A Secret Chronology of the World Volume 3 when Meteor House publishes it! All three volumes are AUTHORIZED companions to Win Scott Eckert's Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World Volumes 1 and 2!

Crossover Covers: Neck and Neck

 

Sergeant Beef investigates two murders, those of his biographer Lionel Townsend’s aunt and a publisher. Beef tells Townsend he’d like to know what’s happening between his (Townsend’s) brother Vincent and their relative Edith Payne. Townsend says that there’s nothing going on between them, to which Beef replies, “That’s what I mean...It’s like the old Sherlock Holmes gag of the behavior of the dog in the night.” The publisher’s secretary compares Townsend to Dr. Watson and Captain Hastings. Beef complains, “As I’ve said before, hardly anybody seems to have heard the name Beef. Now take Hercule Poirot..." The publisher’s stepson is a Major in the 10th Loamshires. Sherlock Holmes’ famous quote about the curious incident of the dog in the night-time appears in Doyle and Watson’s “The Adventure of Silver Blaze.” Captain Arthur Hastings is Hercule Poirot’s friend and sometime biographer, whose accounts were edited for publication by Agatha Christie. The Loamshire Regiment appears in several works of fiction, including H. C. “Sapper” McNeile’s Bulldog Drummond novels, Evelyn Waugh’s Put Out More Flags and Men at Arms, and the movie The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp. The English county of Loamshire is originally from George Eliot’s novels. 

This crossover is one of hundreds covered 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!

Crossover TV Episode: Harvest

 

In this episode of Endeavour set in September 1967, Dr. Tristan Berger has a surgery in King's Abbot, the setting of Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot novel The Murder of Roger Ackroyd.

This crossover is one of hundreds covered in my book Crossovers Expanded: A Secret Chronology of the World Volume 3, which will be published by Meteor House! Like the first two volumes, this one is an AUTHORIZED companion to Win Scott Eckert's Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World Volumes 1 and 2!

Crossover of the Week

October 1937

CASE WITH NO CONCLUSION 

Sergeant Beef is hired by Peter Ferrers to clear the name of his brother Stewart, who is in custody for the murder of the family doctor. Beef mentions his fellow detectives, Lord Simon Plimsoll, Nigel Strangeways, Anthony Gethryn, Albert Campion, and Dr. Gideon Fell, as well as his cousin Sergeant Matthew Beef, John Meredith’s assistant. Peter says Inspector Meredith, Inspector French, and Amer Picon were all too busy to take the case. Crime reporter Angus Braithwaite had been peeved by the certainty of success of various private investigators of whom he’s read, from Holmes and Blake to Thorndike and Mason. Plimsoll, Picon, and Monsignor Smith are quoted in Braithwaite’s paper, The Daily Dose, about Beef’s failure to solve the case and prevent Stewart’s hanging. 

1939 novel by Lionel Townsend, edited by Leo Bruce. Lord Simon Plimsoll, a disguised version of Dorothy L. Sayers’ detective Lord Peter Wimsey, met Beef in Bruce’s Case for Three Detectives. Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot also appeared in that novel under the pseudonym “Amer Picon,” and G. K. Chesterton’s Father Brown as “Monsignor Smith.” Wimsey, Poirot, Father Brown, Philip MacDonald’s detective Anthony Gethryn, Margery Allingham’s Albert Campion, John Dickson Carr’s Dr. Gideon Fell, Freeman Wills Crofts’ Inspector French, Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes, Sexton Blake, R. Austin Freeman’s Dr. Thorndyke (to use the correct spelling), and Erle Stanley Gardner’s Perry Mason (who is actually an attorney, not a private investigator, though he did often make use of P.I. Paul Drake’s services in his cases) have all been included in the CU. This novel brings in Nicholas Blake’s detective Nigel Strangeways and Francis Gerard’s Sir John Meredith and Sergeant Matthew Beef. One of the characters mentions going to see the Shirley Temple movie Little Miss Broadway, which came out on July 29, 1938. However, the next novel in the series, Case with 4 Clowns, takes place from April 25-May 4, 1938, and mentions the events of this book as having occurred six months ago at the beginning. Therefore, I am placing it in October 1937.

This crossover writeup is one of the hundreds included in my book Crossovers Expanded: A Secret Chronology of the World Volume 3, to 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!

Crossover TV Episode: Confection

 

In this episode of Endeavour set in mid September 1969, King's Abbot and Pigstanton are mentioned. King's Abbot is from Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot novel The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, while Pigstanton is from Evelyn Waugh's novel A Handful of Dust.

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

Crossover of the Week

Winter 1939

THE CASE OF THE PAINTED LADIES 

Anthony Bathurst investigates the murder of Stock Exchange operator Aubrey Coventry. Chief Inspector Andrew MacMorran says, “We may be on to something” to Bathurst, who replies, “If we go all Poirot and use our little grey cells—we shall be—undoubtedly.” Bathurst later remembers Holmes’ disparaging comments to Watson about Lecoq, and later still quotes to MacMorran Holmes’ statement about a person’s “brain-attic.” As part of his plan to trap the killer, he arranges to be a guest on a radio quiz show, along with three other detectives: Reginald Fortune, Colonel Anthony Ruthven Gethryn, and Philip Trent. 

1940 novel by Brian Flynn. Given the other crossovers, there is no reason why Bathurst’s reference to Poirot could not be to a real fellow sleuth. Holmes’ comments, including the one about Emile Gaboriau’s detective Monsieur Lecoq, are recorded in Doyle and Watson’s A Study in Scarlet. H. C. Bailey’s Reginald Fortune, Philip MacDonald’s Colonel Gethryn, and E. C. Bentley’s Philip Trent are all in the CU already.

This crossover writeup is one of hundreds found 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 Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World Volumes 1 and 2 by Win Scott Eckert!

Crossover Cover: Too Many Detectives

 

Are you a fan of classic detective fiction?

Then you'll love this novel by Kyotaro Nishimura, in which Maigret, Ellery Queen, Hercule Poirot, and Kogoro Akechi battle Arsene Lupin and the Fiend with Twenty Faces!

For more information, be sure to purchase my book Crossovers Expanded: A Secret Chronology of the World Volume 3, to 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!

Crossover Cover: Sir John Magill's Last Journey

Inspector French tells a fellow policeman to “use your grey cells, as that Belgian would say.” “That Belgian” is Hercule Poirot.

This crossover is one of hundreds covered in my book Crossovers Expanded: A Secret Chronology of the World Volume 3, to be published by Meteor House! Much like the first two volumes, this book is an AUTHORIZED companion to Win Scott Eckert's Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World Volumes 1 and 2!

Crossover of the Week

June 1968

PASSENGER 

Chief Inspector Thursday’s daughter Joan tells him she and her mother Win are going to buy a new lamp and have lunch at Burridges. During his investigation, Detective Sergeant Morse visits the Crossroads Motel in Kings Oak, where a cleaner called Mrs. T is mentioned. Several train stations are referenced, including Chadwick, Hamingwell Halt, Pudham, Whimperley, and Norborough. A Hammond & Sons Hauliers truck appears. 

Episode of Endeavour broadcast February 18, 2018. Burridges Department Store is from the movie Trouble in Store and has been mentioned on Endeavour previously. The Crossroads Motel and Kings Oak are from the TV series Crossroads. Amy Turtle was the motel’s cleaner. Chadwick Station is from August Derleth’s Solar Pons story “The Adventure of the Lost Locomotive.” Hamingwell Halt and Pudham Stations are from the movie The Great St. Trinian’s Train Robbery. Whimperley Station is from Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot novella “Dead Man’s Mirror.” Norborough Station is from The Avengers episode “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Station.” Hammond & Sons Hauliers is a reference to the 1972-1976 TV series The Brothers. In the show, the Hammond family’s business was called Hammond Transport Services, but it’s not unlikely that they could have changed the name in the intervening years. 

I chose to highlight an Endeavour episode because the series finale, "Exeunt," airs today in the U.K. In nine seasons, this show racked up a truly impressive number of shout-outs to other works. Major props to show creator Russell Lewis and his team for their role in expanding the rich tapestry that is the Crossover Universe!!!

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! Like its predecessors, the new volume is an AUTHORIZED companion to Win Scott Eckert's Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World Volumes 1 and 2!

Crossover of the Week

July 1922

THE BIZARRE ADVENTURE OF THE OCTAGON HOUSE 

Sherlock Holmes meets Denis Nayland Smith at Scotland Yard. Smith has carefully studied Limehouse, particularly the Devil Doctor who permeates that region. Besides Solar Pons and Dr. Lyndon Parker, Holmes enlists the aid of the Belgian consultant at 14 Farraway Street, whose friend Captain Hastings married and moved to Argentina the previous autumn, and who is himself investigating the Doctor, whom his biographer would later disguise under the name Li Chang Yen. Nayland Smith and Dr. Petrie insist on being involved. At Scotland Yard, Dr. Watson nods at Inspectors Charles Parker (a relation of Dr. Parker), Stanislaus Oates, and Jimmy Japp, who says M. Poirot has additional information about the Aberystwyth case. Holmes and Watson seek information on soils from Dr. John Thorndyke and his assistant Dr. Christopher Jervis. Another of Thorndyke’s helpers is researcher Nathaniel Polton. As they leave Thorndyke’s home, Holmes and Watson run into Superintendent Miller. Watson says that a few weeks later, he, Holmes, Pons, Parker, Thorndyke, Jervis, Nayland Smith, and Petrie visited the now-empty Colsworth estate. Lord Peter was invited to attend, but he declined, and in his place came an American, either twenty-two or twenty-three years of age, named Jones who recently completed his undergraduate degree at the University of Chicago and was soon planning to attend a graduate program in linguistics at the Sorbonne. 

Story by Dr. Watson, edited by David Marcum in The Meeting of the Minds: Cases of Sherlock Holmes & Solar Pons I, David Marcum, ed., Belanger Books, 2021. Sir Denis Nayland Smith and Dr. Petrie are Dr. Fu Manchu’s archenemies in Sax Rohmer’s novels. The Devil Doctor made several unnamed appearances in August Derleth’s Solar Pons stories. The Belgian consultant is Hercule Poirot. Li Chang Yen battled Poirot in Agatha Christie’s The Big Four. Rick Lai identified Li Chang Yen with Fu Manchu in his essay “Partners in Crime: Fu Manchu and Carl Peterson.” Captain Arthur Hastings and Inspector James Japp are from the Poirot books. The Aberystwyth case is mentioned in Christie’s Murder on the Links. Chief Inspector Charles Parker is the friend and brother-in-law of Dorothy L. Sayers’ detective Lord Peter Wimsey. Inspector Stanislaus Oates is from Margery Allingham’s Albert Campion books. Drs. Thorndyke and Jervis, Nathaniel Polton, and Superintendent Miller are from R. Austin Freeman’s detective novels. Jones is Indiana Jones. Indy would in fact be twenty-three in July 1922.

This crossover write-up is one of hundreds to be found in my upcoming book Crossovers Expanded: A Secret Chronology of the World Volume 3, to be published by Meteor House. All three volumes are AUTHORIZED companions to Win Scott Eckert's books Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World Volumes 1 and 2!

Crossover Cover: The Crown Jewel Caper

In one of the stories in this anthology comic, the Black Cat steals an alleged treasure map leading to the Crown Jewels of France for antiquarian Hervé Marat, who calls the Kingpin to tell him the Cat is about to fall into a police trap. However, the female thief manages to escape the gendarmes. Inspector Gorlier is nevertheless glad they have recovered the fake map they planted, since it can be used as evidence, and they have outwitted the Cat. One of the gendarmes serving under Gorlier, Henri Poirot, is pleased to have an entertaining story to tell his great-uncle. Henri’s great-uncle is, of course, Hercule Poirot. Julian Symons has placed Hercule’s birth in 1864, which would make him 125-years-old at the time of this story; however, Rick Lai’s essay “Partners in Crime: Fu Manchu and Carl Peterson” (Rick Lai’s Secret Histories: Criminal Masterminds, Altus Press, 2009) provides a possible explanation for the Belgian sleuth’s longevity. Both the Black Cat and the Kingpin have independent links bringing them into the CU.

Crossover Cover: The Fifth Heart

A Sherlock Holmes pastiche. Colonel Moran is identified as Colonel John Sebastian “Tiger Jack” Moran, the same full name and nickname given for him in George MacDonald Fraser’s Flashman and the Tiger. Inspector Hanaud (a detective seen in novels by A. E. W. Mason) and Hercule Poirot are mentioned, and the Lakota Indian Paha Sapa from Simmons’ novel Black Hills appears. The revelations in this novel about Holmes and Moriarty place it in an alternate universe.

Crossover E-Book: The Belgian and the Beekeeper

The French detective Jules Poiret (who is frequently confused with Hercule Poirot, a Belgian detective who recently investigated a mysterious affair at Styles) and Sherlock Holmes become involved in a sequel incident to The Sign of The Four, discovering Watson may not have been entirely honest in his account of the case. Jules Poiret, who may have been a partial inspiration for Poirot, is from Frank Howel Evans’ The Murder Club. Hercules Popeau, also cited as a possible inspiration for Poirot, appears in Marie Belloc Lowndes’ story “Popeau Intervenes.” Georges La Touche is from Freeman Wills Crofts’ novel The Cask. Inspector Juve and Fantômas are from Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre’s novels. Arsène Lupin is Maurice Leblanc’s gentleman thief. Joseph Rouletabille is a detective created by Gaston Leroux. Sven Hjerson is a fictional Finnish detective created by author Ariadne Oliver in Agatha Christie’s works. The disturbing implications that the Agra treasure was not lost but rather stolen by Watson, who married Mary Morstan in order to capitalize on her newfound wealth, and that he may have later murdered Mary, would be enough to place this story outside CU continuity, but the metafictional piece following it, “Holmes and Watson: A Conversation,” clinches it, with Watson revealing to Holmes they, Poiret, and Poirot are all fictional characters, and the many inconsistencies in Watson’s accounts are really the fault of their creator.

Crossover Cover: Chef Maurice and a Spot of Truffle

Chef Maurice Manchot, proprietor of the Le Cochon Rouge restaurant in the English village of Beakley, investigates the murder of his wild herb and mushroom supplier. The elderly Miss Fey asks Chef Maurice, who replies that he’s actually French, if he’s Belgian, saying, “I knew a Belgian once, a little fellow. He asked a lot of questions too.” The little Belgian fellow is Hercule Poirot, bringing Chef Maurice into the CU.

Crossover Covers: Inspector Wilkins

This series of novels is an affectionate pastiche of 1930s locked room mystery novels, with Inspector Wilkins repeatedly having to investigate murders at the home of the unlucky Earl of Burford. All three novels have references to detective fiction of that era, which treat the characters mentioned as real people. In The Affair of the Bloodstained Egg Cosy (published in 1975), Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot is referred to by Wilkins. The Affair of the Mutilated Mink (1983) has several references: Dorothy L. Sayers' Lord Peter Wimsey; Michael Innes' Sir John Appleby (along with Richard Eliot's book The Spider Bites Back from the Appleby novel Stop Press); Ngaio Marsh's Inspector Roderick Alleyn; Agatha Christie's Ariadne Oliver (from the Hercule Poirot books, as well as the non-series novel The Pale Horse) and her book Death of a Debutante (mentioned in Mrs. McGinty's Dead); and The Screaming Bone by Annette de la Tour, the pen name of Mr. Judd in Edmund Crispin's Gervase Fen novel Buried for Pleasure. The third and final Wilkins novel, The Case of the 39 Cufflinks, refers to Lord Peter Wimsey once again, along with his manservant Bunter.

Crossover Cover: Mafia Fix

In this novel, Remo Williams encounters, and ends up fighting with, James Bond, Mister Moto, and Hercule Poirot, none of whom are referred to by name.

Crossover of the Week

Late November 1951

COLD BLOOD

            Sergeant William Beef’s biographer, Townsend, tells him that he needs a unique quality to make him famous as a detective: “You must resemble an alligator every few pages, like Mrs. Bradley, or talk like a peer in an Edwardian farce, like Lord Peter Wimsey. Or use bits of exclamatory French, like Poirot.” Theo Gray asks Beef to look into the death of his friend, Cosmo Ducrow. Townsend thinks, “How different, I could not help reflecting, was the conversation of Holmes and Watson while they sat waiting for their clients not half a mile away.” Noting that there are better known detectives than he, with better reputations, Beef asks Gray why he did not consult Poirot, to which Gray responds that he was engaged on another case. When Beef asks the same about Albert Campion, Gray replies that Campion was not interested. Beef says that he wonders where Gray will be if he refuses the case, to which Gray responds “On the phone to Inspector French…”

            Novel by Lionel Townsend, edited by Leo Bruce. Gladys Mitchell’s Mrs. Bradley, Dorothy L. Sayer’s Lord Peter Wimsey, Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot, Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, Margery Allingham’s Albert Campion, and Freeman Wills Crofts’ Inspector French have all been established as existing in the CU; therefore, this crossover brings in Sergeant Beef. Beef’s cottage, where he first meets with Gray, is in Lilac Crescent, and was chosen for its proximity to Baker Street. Holmes and Watson were no longer living at 221B Baker Street in 1951, so Townsend must have been referring to their conversations in years past.

Crossover of the Week

October 18-December 6, 1925

THE EXPRESS DIARIES

            An unlikely assemblage of individuals travels across Europe via the Orient Express to obtain the pieces of a statue called the Sedefkar Simulacrum before the cult known as the Brothers of the Skin. Professor Julius Smith, whose apparent death sets the adventurers on their course, first speaks at the Challenger Trust Banquet Lecture. One of the members of the group, Professor Alphonse Moretti, finds a reference to the Simulacrum in von Juntz’s Unaussprechlichen Kulten. The Duc d’Essientes is a member of the Brothers of the Skin. Moretti finds mentions of a Duc Jean Floressas d’Essientes in fashion and society papers from Paris in the 1870s. The leader of the expedition, Mrs. Betty Sunderland, writes in her diary “I suspect even the remarkable Mr. S. Holmes would find it difficult to uncover a trail grown so cold.” A portly balding gentleman with a small waxed moustache, who is either French or Belgian, appears.

            Novel by Nick Marsh, Innsmouth Free Press, 2012. The Challenger Trust is likely named after Professor George Edward Challenger from Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Lost World and other works. Consulting detective Sherlock Holmes is Doyle’s most famous creation. Friedrich von Juntz’s Unaussprechlichen Kulten is a book created by Robert E. Howard to be part of H.P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos. The Duc d’Essientes (originally des Esseintes) is from J.-K. Huysmans’ novel À Rebours. The Duc appears to have extended his life via supernatural means. The gentleman with the waxed moustache is Agatha Christie’s detective Hercule Poirot.