“Tales of the Shadowmen: Lords of Terror” (2008) is the fourth volume of this eclectic anthology series from Black Coat Press.
It makes use of a concept of Philip José Farmer that has various fictional characters set in the same “universe,” thus able to met and interact. Don’t make the assumption that all the stories are linked. They often are not. Most are standalone, and can usually be read in any order.
What can be daunting is that this series uses characters of popular literary culture (mainly written, but sometimes film and TV), and not “high brow” characters. And the characters are taken from American, British, French, and other countries, so often if you’re not familiar with those characters, it can be confusing. Or, it could lead you to start reading the original stories of these characters, which BCP does (such as Fantomas, Nyctalope, the Black Coats, Belphegor, Judex, and many more).
Before the stories, we get an interesting introduction that covers the 12 “fathers” of the Shadowmen, the French authors for many of the works and characters that are used in this series: Eugene Sue, Paul Feval, Alexandre Dumas, Pierre-Alexis Ponson du Terrail, Emile Gaboriau, Jules Verne, Gustave Le Rouge, Maurice Leblanc, Gaston Leroux, Maurice Renard, Pierre Souvestre, and Jean de la Hire.
The stories in this collection are:
• Matthew Baugh: “Captain Future and the Lunar Peril” — The time traveling St. Menoux (from a French SF novel) travels to a future to stop a threat created by Madame Atomos in a prior volume. Along the way, he encounters Captain Future (American SF pulp hero), Eric John Stark (created by Leigh Brackett), and Northwest Smith (created by C.L. Moore).
• Bill Cunningham: “Fool Me Once…” has Harry Dickson (the “American Sherlock Holmes,” a German pastiche of Holmes who becomes more a character in his own right) and Fascinax (a French pulp character who is an English doctor gifted with mental powers) fighting against an “M” who has gone bad.
• Win Scott Eckert: “The Atomos Affair” — An interesting tale with Madame Atomos (the vengeful Japanese scientist who swore vengeance against the U.S. for dropping the atomic bombs) using the East Coast blackout of 1965 (which she created) to attack U.N.C.L.E. headquarters.
• Micah Harris: “The Anti-Pope of Avignon” pits Solomon Kane (Robert E. Howard‘s Puritan adventurer) against Fausta (a villainess in the mode of Milady).
• Travis Hiltz: “Three Men, A Martian and a Baby,” in a sort-of direct sequel to his original story, has Doctor Omega (an early French SF character who looks and acts remarkable like the first Doctor) and his now three companions encountering a baby who was shot into space (do I have to tell you who that is?).
• Rick Lai: “Corridors of Deceit” is another story in Rick’s series pitting Joseph Balsamo (the Countess Cagliostro) against her foe, the detective Irena Putin.
• Roman Leary: “The Evils Against Which We Strive” has Sâr Dubnotal (an early French pulp occult detective) teaming up with The Shadow.
• Jean-Marc Lofficier: “Madame Atomos’ Christmas” is a short little tale with Madame Atomos in Dallas in November 1963.
• Randy Lofficier: “The Reluctant Princess” has Doc Ardan (the early French SF character that is used as a Doc Savage pastiche, with the idea this is a name Doc operated under in his early years) awaking “Sleeping Beauty,” who will become the adventurer known as the Phantom Angel.
• Xavier Mauméjean: “A Wooster Christmas” is a fun story with Hercule Poirot and Bertie Wooster. (I hope I don’t need to explain who these characters are.)
• Jess Nevins: “Red in Tooth and Claw” has Rocambole (an early French anti-hero who becomes an adventurer) in England during the time he is still a villain. He is looking to build up his purse by rigging a rat fight.
• Kim Newman: “Angels of Music II: The Mark of Kane” is another story of The Phantom of the Opera‘s “Angels of Music,” a trio of girls he has trained to be his agents, like Charlie’s Angels.
• John Peel: “Twenty Thousand Years Under the Sea” has Captain Nemo finding sunken R’lyeh.
• Steven A. Roman: “Night’s Children” has Irma Vep (a French silent movie serial character, who led a gang of thieves called Les Vampires) in Berlin, where she encounters a real vampire, Count Orlock.
• John Shirley: “Cyrano and the Two Plumes” has the two French swordsmen Cyrano de Bergerac and d’Artagnan meeting.
• Brian Stableford: “The Return of Frankenstein” (part III of “The Empire of the Necromancers”) is the next in this serialized novel starring Gregory Temple (aka John Devil) and the Frankenstein Monster.
At the end of the volume is information on the characters used and who created them, tho this may not help point you to where they are from. (Wikipedia is most useful here, along with Black Coat Press’s French Wold Newton site and Cool French Comics site). The “Starring” lists the characters who appear in the story, “Co-starring” lists characters mentioned in the story, and “Also Starring” lists places and things that appear or are mentioned in the story.
I have all the past volumes and always look forward to the next in this annual series.
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