Crossover of the Week

May 1, 2011-September 11, 2012

MIDNIGHT AT THE OASIS

            Quincey Morris and Libby Chastain battle a Middle Eastern terrorist cell that has acquired control of an afreet. A Navy SEAL and combat magician volunteered to spend six months in the U.K. under the tutelage of an ex-SAS sergeant major, who was said to be the greatest combat magician living. Quincey and Libby’s ally, FBI agent Colleen O’Donnell, mentions a blood spatter analyst named Morgan who worked on a case in Chicago. Quincey and Libby discuss the time they traveled to London for “that Castor thing.” Quincey meets with another colleague, Barry Love, who refers to rumors of an afreet driving a cab in New York for a while. Quincey and Barry set up a meeting at Strangefellows Bar and Grill; Quincey says that there’s another bar of that name in the U.K., and Barry knows a man in the same line of work as them named John who hangs out at the English bar. When Quincey arrives at Strangefellows, Barry is talking to a werewolf named Larry Talbot. Barry tells Quincey about a vampire he once encountered named Jerry, who was fond of apples and was killed by a high school kid after going to California. As Quincey and Barry part ways, Barry says that he is planning to deal with a guy called Pinhead. The terrorists use a spell called the Tarnhelm Effect to mask their breaking into a zoo, and discuss potential threats to their plot, including a magician in Chicago named Dresden and a woman named Blake in St. Louis.

            Novella by Justin Gustainis, 2013. The ex-SAS Sergeant Major and combat magician is William Gravel from Warren Ellis’ comic books Strange Kiss and Gravel. Morgan is Dexter Morgan, a blood spatter analyst and secret serial killer of other murderers, from the television series Dexter. However, Dexter works for the Miami Metro Police Department’s Homicide division, and has never been based in Chicago. Most likely, Dexter was on loan to the Chicago Police Department for this case, and O’Donnell merely assumed he worked for the CPD full time. “That Castor thing” is a reference to Felix Castor, an occult detective created by Mike Carey. The Castor books take place in a world where the public knows supernatural beings exist, so the Castor mentioned by Quincey and Libby must be the Crossover Universe counterpart of the character seen in Carey’s novels. Barry Love is a disguised version of Clive Barker’s occult investigator Harry D’Amour. Pinhead is from Barker’s story “The Hellbound Heart,” as well as the Hellraiser film series. The afreet that drove a cab in New York City appears in Neil Gaiman’s novel American Gods. The British Strangefellows is featured in Simon R. Green’s Nightside books; the main character of that series is private eye John Taylor. Larry Talbot is from the classic horror film The Wolf Man and its sequels. Jerry is Jerry Dandridge from the movie Fright Night.The Tarnhelm Effect is from Randall Garrett’s Lord Darcy books, which take place in an alternate universe where Richard the Lionheart did not die in the year 1199 and magic has supplanted science. Obviously, the Tarnhelm Effect exists in both Lord Darcy’s universe and the CU. Dresden is Harry Dresden, the protagonist of Jim Butcher’s The Dresden Files series of novels, while Blake is Laurell K. Hamilton’s vampire hunter Anita Blake. Like the Felix Castor novels, the Anita Blake novels take place in an alternate universe where the general public is aware of the existence of the supernatural. Therefore, the Anita Blake mentioned in Gustainis’ Morris and Chastain Supernatural Investigations novels must be the CU counterpart of Hamilton’s character. Although this novella supposedly takes place shortly after the last entry in the series, Play with Fire, Gustainis must have compressed the timeline of events. Play with Fire begins shortly after the novel preceding it, Sympathy for the Devil, which ends the day after Inauguration Day. The last Inauguration Day before the publication of Sympathy for the Devil was January 20, 2009. The inspiration for the terrorists’ actions in Midnight at the Oasis is the death of Osama bin Laden, which occurred on May 2, 2011.

Crossover of the Week

Late January-March 2009

PLAY WITH FIRE

            Occult detectives Quincey Morris and Libby Chastain and their allies – FBI agents Dale Fenton and Colleen O’Donnell, hitman Mal Peters, and a demon using the mortal alias Ashley –battle a cult that is literally trying to raise Hell on Earth. Quincey says that one of his ancestors was a Marshal in Dodge City. Quincey and Libby help occult P.I. Barry Love clear a hellhound out of his office. O’Donnell refers to a report written by Monica Reyes of the New Orleans Field Office. Fenton and O’Donnell’s boss Susan Whitlavich became head of the Behavioral Science Unit after her own boss, Jack Crawford, suffered a fatal heart attack. Whitlavich tells Fenton and O’Donnell that she’s smoothed things over for them with Bernie Jenks at the Las Vegas Field Office.

            Novella by Justin Gustainis, 2012. Quincey’s ancestor is Marshal Matt Dillon from the radio and television series Gunsmoke. Barry Love is a disguised version of Clive Barker’s occult detective Harry D’Amour. Agent Monica Reyes is from The X-Files. Jack Crawford is from Thomas Harris’ Hannibal Lecter novels. Crawford died of a heart attack in Hannibal. Las Vegas-based FBI agent Bernie Jenks met Carl Kolchak in the TV movie The Night Stalker. Bernie would be elderly by 2009, so this Bernie Jenks must be a relative of his, likely his grandson. The end of this novella leads directly into the next entry in the series, Midnight at the Oasis. However, as explained in the 2011 entry for that novella, Gustainis must have compressed the actual amount of time between the two stories.

Crossover of the Week

October 31, 2007-January 21, 2009

SYMPATHY FOR THE DEVIL

            Quincey Morris and Libby Chastain attempt to prevent presidential candidate Howard Stark, who has been possessed by the demon Sargatanas, from winning the election and destroying the Earth. The tabloid The National Tattler is mentioned several times, and FBI agents Colleen O’Donnell and Melanie Blaise discuss the female agent who shot Buffalo Billy. During the Maine primaries, Stark attends a meet-and-greet at the IHOP in Derry, and later hosts a town hall meeting in the auditorium of Bannerman High School in Castle Rock. Quincey says that many weird things have occurred in Castle Rock, and suggests that it may be a nexus of supernatural activity. Malachi Peters, a CIA assassin who was killed in 1983 and ended up in Hell because he enjoyed his work too much, has been sent back to Earth to assassinate Stark. He reminisces about his old boss, “an enigmatic man known only as Mac,” who always referred to a hit as a “touch.” Quincey and Libby discuss other supernatural investigators, including a woman named Anita and Jill Kismet. An assassin called the Grocer’s Boy, whose father was an assassin himself and had a cover identity as a grocer, is hired to murder one of Stark’s fellow candidates. Peters is told by a demon using the name Ashley that she can make his sniper rifle invisible using a variation of the Tarnhelm effect.

            Novel by Justin Gustainis, 2011. The National Tattler is from the Hannibal Lecter novels by Thomas Harris, as is Agent Clarice Starling, who shot serial killer Buffalo Bill in The Silence of the Lambs. The Maine towns of Derry and Castle Rock appear in many novels and short stories by Stephen King. Bannerman High School is named after the late Sheriff George Bannerman from King’s The Dead Zone and Cujo. Mac is Matt Helm’s boss in Donald Hamilton’s novels. Hamilton portrayed Helm as a member of a separate organization from the CIA, so perhaps the references in the series to Peters being a former CIA agent are an error or fictionalization on Gustainis’ part, and he was actually a member of the same agency as Helm. Anita is a reference to Laurell K. Hamilton’s vampire hunter Anita Blake, while Jill Kismet appears in novels by Lilith Saintcrow. The Anita Blake and Jill Kismet series both portray the general public as being aware of the existence of the supernatural, which is incompatible with CU continuity; the Blake and Kismet mentioned in this novel, therefore, must be versions unique to the CU, who have had very different adventures from their better-known counterparts. The Grocer’s Boy is meant to be a pastiche of the hitman known as the Butcher’s Boy, who appeared in three novels by Thomas Perry. Indeed, Gustainis refers to him (possibly accidentally) as the Butcher’s Boy at one point, and therefore it can be assumed for CU continuity that he is in fact a disguised version of Perry’s assassin. The Tarnhelm effect is a spell used to make specific objects or people invisible to others in the Lord Darcy stories by Randall Garrett. Since the Lord Darcy tales take place in an alternate reality where Richard the Lionheart did not die in 1199 and the world is governed by laws of magic rather than physics, the Tarnhelm effect must exist both in the CU and Lord Darcy’s universe.