Crossover Cover: Robert B. Parker's Angel Eyes

 

Spenser briefly runs into Robert Crais’ P.I. Joe Pike. By the time this novel takes place, Spenser would be in his eighties, and likely retired. It stretches credibility that he and his entire supporting cast would have access to an immortality elixir. The novel is also based heavily on Dashiell Hammett’s Continental Op novel The Dain Curse, with some of the characters having the same names and roles. Since the Op is in the CU, this further cements the novel as an AU.

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: Stardust

 

Are you a fan of Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe novels?

Then you'll love this Spenser novel by Robert B. Parker which features a fictional locale from the Marlowe novel Playback!

For more intel, check out my book Crossovers Expanded: A Secret Chronology of the World Volume 3, which is 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: Outlaws

A meeting about bank robberies being committed by a group of young radicals is held in the offices of Ward Keane, District Attorney of Plymouth County. The criminals are later put on trial for murder, with Special Assistant Attorney General Terry Gleason acting as prosecutor. The landlord of the Broad Street Grille is quoted in the Boston Commoner. Keane and Gleason were first mentioned in Higgins’ novel Impostors, which also features Roger Kidd from Higgins' Jerry Kennedy series. The first book in that series, Kennedy for the Defense, has a reference to Robert B. Parker's P.I. Spenser. The Boston Commoner newspaper appears in a number of Higgins’ books, including the aforementioned Impostors; the Jerry Kennedy series; Wonderful Years, Wonderful Years; Victories, a sequel to the novel Trust; and Bomber’s Law.

Crossover Cover: Sex, Lies, and Private Eyes

This anthology from Moonstone includes two crossovers. In C.J. Henderson's "The Mind of the Dead," psychometrist Lai Wan comes to the aid of Carl Kolchak when they turn out to be investigating the same series of crimes. Kolchak also encountered Lai Wan in Spring 1997 during the events of Henderson and Joe Gentile’s novel Partners in Crime. September 15 is a Saturday, placing this story in 1997 as well, after Partners in Crime. “The Mind of the Dead” does not address whether Kolchak and Lai Wan have met before. In John Lutz's "Recreational Vehicle," a St. Louis private eye named Nudger travels to Florida to help his girlfriend’s aunt and uncle, who are being blackmailed, and works with his fellow P.I. Fred Carver to resolve the situation. Lutz’s P.I. Fred Carver is in the CU through a mention of Robert B. Parker’s eye Spenser in his first appearance, Tropical Heat, as well as a brief appearance in Robert J. Randisi’s Miles Jacoby novel Hard Look. This crossover brings in Lutz’s other series P.I. character, Alo Nudger.

Crossover Cover: Impostors

Mark Baldwin, the CEO of a communications empire that includes the Boston Commoner newspaper, is friends with lawyer Roger Kidd. The fictional Boston Commoner appears in a number of Higgins’ books, including his series about lawyer Jerry Kennedy, who is already in the CU via a reference to Robert B. Parker's private eye Spenser in the first novel, Kennedy for the Defense. Roger Kidd is a supporting character in the Kennedy books.

Crossover Cover: More Blood

This authorized anthology of new Destroyer stories written by fans of the series, co-edited by Warren Murphy's son, has two stories with crossovers. One is Brad Mengel's "The Roads Not Taken." A cop turned soldier in Vietnam named Remo is greeted by a sentry named Michael Long, also a cop in civilian life. Remo’s platoon mates have nicknamed him the Destroyer, just as others in the group have been dubbed the Exterminator, Hannibal, and Sergeant Mercy. Remo considers becoming a soldier of fortune when his tour of duty ends, "like that Rainey fellow people [keep] talking about." Remo can see himself like James Bond, traveling the world to protect America. A visiting soldier tells a group of listeners about how he cleared a fellow soldier of the allegation of a massacre at Hoi Binh. This soldier, named Bolan, also tells them a story he heard from a guy named Spenser in Korea. Michael Long (later known as Michael Knight) is from the TV series Knight Rider. The Exterminator is John Eastland from the movies The Exterminator and Exterminator 2. Hannibal is John "Hannibal" Smith from the TV show The A-Team. Sergeant Mercy was the wartime nickname of Mack Bolan, aka the Executioner, the vigilante created by Don Pendleton. Bolan cleared the name of Niles Barrabas in "Incident at Hoi Binh," included in Executioner #63: The New War Book. Barrabas is the protagonist of another series, The Soldiers of Barrabas by Jack Hild. Jim Rainey is the hero of Peter McCurtin’s Soldier of Fortune series. James Bond needs no explanation. Spenser is Robert B. Parker’s future private investigator. In R.J. Carter's "Fool's Paradise," Remo Williams and Chiun team up with a masked vigilante to end the threat of the sentient computer chip Friend, which has been corrupted by the caped crusader’s archenemy, a psychotic clown. Mark Howard, assistant director of CURE, tells Remo, "Thanks to the run of unique characters that regularly pass through this city, your street clothes and your blurred-out features have the newscasters crediting some faceless vigilante, with the'‘man in the kimono' as his partner and sensei. Richard Salamander, Rick Dragon, something like that.' There is apparently some bad blood between Chiun and this latter individual. The vigilante says that more than one of the defense mechanisms in his cave headquarters were designed to contend with an out-of-control extraterrestrial, should the need ever arise. Although the masked vigilante is not referred to by name, the story makes it abundantly clear that he is the Batman. Per CU continuity, this would be the as-yet unidentified fourth Batman, whose predecessors were Bruce Wayne Sr., Dick Grayson, and Bruce Wayne Jr. His archenemy is the Joker. The faceless vigilante is another DC Comics hero, the Question (although he was originally published by Charlton Comics), while his sensei is martial arts master Richard Dragon. The extraterrestrial against whose losing control Batman is taking precautions is Superman.

Crossover Cover: Getting Up with Fleas

Devlin “Trace” Tracy is hired by his former employer at an insurance company to protect a freewheeling actor on the set of his latest film. Trace’s office is above Bogie’s Restaurant, which is frequented by mystery writers and other P.I.s; Trace says, “Now, Bogie’s is getting out-of-town trade too. Only about a week before, there was this private detective from Boston who stopped in. He had a quiche cookbook under one arm and he ordered some kind of Yugoslavian beer and got drunk after two sips and then wanted to talk to the bartender about the meaning of courage.” Detectives Ed Razoni and “Tough” Jackson investigate the hit-and-run murder of a man mistaken for the actor due to the star giving him his jacket. The Boston private detective is Robert B. Parker’s Spenser, though Trace is probably exaggerating his behavior somewhat. Murphy wrote a series of novels about Detectives Razoni and Jackson in 1973-1974. Trace first met the duo in Too Old a Cat, which I covered in a previous post.