Crossover of the Week

Spring 1939 

THE SONG OF THE STORM 

A gangster’s henchman brings I. V. Frost the remains of a manuscript his boss burned, about one of Thomas Carnacki’s cases. In the manuscript, Carnacki identifies the charm on Sir Evan Chichester’s watch as the Talisman of Byagoona, which legend holds dates to antediluvian Stygia, and can allegedly switch one person’s mind into another’s body. The ancient sorcerer currently inhabiting the gangster’s body was given the Talisman by Byagoona. He tells Frost about some of his old foes, including the greatest swordsman in Spanish California and a famous gunfighter and his lover. The entity Rhagorthua taught him how to summon a storm by singing. 

Short story by Matthew Baugh in I. V. Frost: Tales of Mystery and Scientific Detection, Joe Gentile and Kim Perisin, eds., Moonstone Books, 2017. Thomas Carnacki is from William Hope Hodgson’s Carnacki, the Ghost-Finder. Byagoona is a Great Old One from James Ambuehl’s “The Bane of Byagoona.” Stygia is from Robert E. Howard’s Conan stories. The sorcerer wielding the Talisman battled Zorro in Baugh’s story “Zorro and the Bruja” (More Tales of Zorro, Richard Dean Starr, ed., Moonstone Books, 2010), and a fictionalized version of the historical gunfighter Mysterious Dave Mather in his tale “Trail of the Brujo” (Low Noon: Tales of Horror and Dark Fantasy from the Weird Weird West, David B. Riley, ed., Science Fiction Trails, 2012). Rhagorthua is from David Conyers’ “A Handful of Dust.” 

This crossover writeup is one of over a thousand included 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: The Bride of the Hound

 

In this story by Joshua M. Reynolds, Charles St. Cyprian, Nadja Highmill, and Philip Wendy-Smythe attend a party at Myrdstone Manor. Carnacki’s death at Ypres is mentioned. Nadja has said barely two words to their host, Delilah Myrdstone, since Gussie’s Christmas party last year. Delilah’s fiancé Mueller tells St. Cyprian certain translations of the Bible reference “the ghouls that burrow.” Wendy-Smythe mentions the primitive buildings found at Exham Priory a few years ago and says von Juntz was right about ghouls. “The Myrdstone Witch-Cult” is mentioned in Lin Carter’s Anton Zarnak story “Curse of the Black Pharaoh.” Carnacki is from William Hope Hodgson’s Carnacki, the Ghost-Finder. Carnacki’s death was likely staged, given his post-World War I appearances in the CU. Gussie is Gussie Fink-Nottle from P. G. Wodehouse’s Jeeves books. The Biblical references to “the ghouls that burrow” are fictional and derived from Robert Barbour Johnson’s “Far Below.” Exham Priory is from H. P. Lovecraft’s “The Rats in the Walls.” Friedrich von Juntz, the author of Unaussprechlichen Kulten, is from Robert E. Howard’s Mythos fiction.

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: The Wedding Seal

 

In Josh Reynolds' story in this anthology, Charles St. Cyprian and Ebe Gallowglass encounter selkies in the Orkney Islands. Carnacki is mentioned, and St. Cyprian’s head is described as ringing like the Nine Tailors of Fenchurch St. Paul. Carnacki is from William Hope Hodgson’s Carnacki, the Ghost-Finder. The Nine Tailors of Fenchurch St. Paul are from Dorothy L. Sayers’ Lord Peter Wimsey novel The Nine Tailors.

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 Cover: The Return of the Hound

 

In this story by Josh Reynolds, Charles St. Cyprian reads in a newspaper about the robbery of Thurlingham Hall last month, whose perpetrator St. Cyprian’s assistant Ebe Gallowglass describes as “that albino with the funny name.” When she suggests they apprehend him themselves, St. Cyprian replies that they'll leave that sort of thing to Blake and Lee and the rest of that lot. Sgt. Robert Ogden and his squad had been seconded to Carnacki during the War. The Si-Fan lurks in every opium den in Limehouse not owned by the Sisterhood of the Rats. St. Cyprian describes his old foe Dr. Gottlieb Hochmuller as “a vivisectionist and member in bad standing of the Kaiser’s pet sorcerous cabal, along with the likes of Erwin Torre or charlatans like Professor ten Brinken.” The albino with the funny name is Zenith the Albino, the archenemy of private detective Sexton Blake. In the story “The Strange Case of the Thurlingham Hall Robbery,” Zenith went up against Blake’s friend and fellow detective Nelson Lee. Thomas Carnacki is from William Hope Hodgson’s Carnacki, the Ghost-Finder. The Si-Fan is from Sax Rohmer’s Fu Manchu novels. Professor Jakob ten Brinken is from Hanns Heinz Ewers’ Alraune.

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!

Happy Holidays! 

Crossover of the Week

Spring 1925
THE PECULIAR CATS OF THE SEA OF DREAMS 
Ismeddin guides Madame Palmyre, Victoria Custer, Mademoiselle Kephra, and Renée to Atlänaat, where they seek a Dreamer. The ladies, after eating drugged fruit, awaken in a vault that has carvings in Arabic script from the writings of an Arab scholar of centuries past, which an American translated as, “That does not sleep, which doth eternal lie, and in strange aeons, even death may die.” Victoria wants to find her lover, Nu, son of Nu, who her brother says she only dreamed was alive. Madame Palmyre believes the Dreamer is her former lover, a god known variously as Azathoth, Cthulhu, Mana-Yood-Sushai, and Baal. The Dreamer sends them to Earth’s Dreamlands. The women meet Randolph Carter, formerly of Boston and currently of Celephaïs. Carter’s bookshelves hold titles such as Astral and Astarral Co-Ordination and Interference, the Black Tome of Alsophocus, the Seven Cryptical Books of Hsan, and the Necronomicon. Carter says his passions are reserved for his books, cats, and his quest to see the Great Ones in their unknown home of Kadath. A cat who gained the power to speak in the waking world after eating his master’s parrot guides the women and Carter past the turquoise temple of Nath-Horthath. Victoria is abducted by men who take her to the Black Galleys, which typically frequent the port of Dylath-Leen. Carter says a shantak-bird could fly his friends to Dylath-Leen, but he does not know how to summon them. Instead, they are transported inside a strange catlike creature. Our heroines confront the men from Leng, as well as creatures resembling bipedal frogs with pink tentacles where their faces should be. 
Short story by Matthew Baugh in Tales of the Shadowmen Volume 16: Voir Dire, Jean-Marc and Randy Lofficier, eds., Black Coat Press, 2019; reprinted in French in Les Compagnons de l’Ombre (Tome 27), Jean-Marc Lofficier, ed., Rivière Blanche, 2020. Ismeddin is the protagonist of a series of stories by E. Hoffmann Price. Atlänaat and the Dreamer are from Price’s stories “The Dreamer of Atlänaat” and “A Jest and a Vengeance.” Madame Palmyre and Baal are from Renée Dunan’s novel Baal. Victoria Custer and Nu are from Edgar Rice Burroughs’ The Eternal Lover. Victoria’s brother Barney is the protagonist of Burroughs’ The Mad King. Mademoiselle Kephra is Cleo Kefra from Jack Mann’s Gees novels Maker of Shadows and The Ninth Life. The Arab scholar is Abdul Alhazred, and the passage quoted is from his Necronomicon, one of the occult tomes of Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos. Azathoth and Cthulhu are also from the Mythos. Mana-Yood-Sushai is from Lord Dunsany’s The Gods of Pegana. The Dreamlands are from Lovecraft and Price’s “Through the Gates of the Silver Key” and the other tales in Lovecraft’s Dream Cycle. Celephaïs is from Lovecraft’s story of the same name, as well as the Dream Cycle tale “The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath,” as is Nath-Horthath. Astral and Astarral Co-Ordination and Interference is from William Hope Hodgson’s “The Whistling Room,” a tale of Carnacki, the ghost-finder. The Black Tome of Alsophocus is from Lovecraft and Martin S. Warnes’ titular story. The Seven Cryptical Books of Hsan are from “The Other Gods” and “The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath.” Kadath is seen or mentioned in several of Lovecraft’s stories. The talking cat is from Joann Sfar’s comic book The Rabbi’s Cat. The Black Galleys, Dylath-Leen, the shantak-birds, the Men of Leng, and the froglike creatures (the Moon-beasts) are from “The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath.” The Catbus is from the animated film My Neighbor Totoro. 
This crossover write-up is one of hundreds included 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 Cover: Ghoul

Young Timmy Graco and his friends find themselves battling a carnivorous ghoul in rural Pennsylvania. The boys are also troubled by the Sawyers’ dog Catcher. The LeHorn family is among the mourners at Timmy’s grandfather’s funeral. The Ghoul knows of the Thirteen, including Behemoth and the Great Wurms, as well as the Siqqusim. It is also familiar with the “ancient race of subterranean swine-things.” The Daemonolateria is mentioned. In Keene’s novel Terminal, Tommy O’Brien also mentions having been attacked by Catcher during his youth. The LeHorn family is from Keene’s novel Dark Hollow; this appearance takes place less than a year before the tragic events that befell them in the flashback portions of that novel. The Thirteen are the main villains of Keene’s mythos, thirteen ancient creatures who survived the destruction of the previous reality by God and now seek the destruction of the current reality, traveling from universe to universe bringing death and destruction; Behemoth and the Great Wurms can be seen in Keene’s Earthworm Gods novels, and the Siqqusim are the main villains of his The Rising series. The subterranean swine-things are from William Hope Hodgson’s novel The House on the Borderland. The Daemonolateria is a fictional book of magic that appears in a number of Keene’s works, including “Caught in a Mosh,” Dark Hollow, and Ghost Walk.