{"id":5653,"date":"2019-02-06T23:16:33","date_gmt":"2019-02-06T23:16:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/greydogtales.com\/blog\/?p=5653"},"modified":"2019-02-06T23:31:09","modified_gmt":"2019-02-06T23:31:09","slug":"sherlock-holmes-and-the-occult-detectives-pt-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/greydogtales.com\/blog\/sherlock-holmes-and-the-occult-detectives-pt-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Sherlock Holmes and the Occult Detectives Pt 2"},"content":{"rendered":"

So, are you interested in submitting a story to a new anthology? And will it be extraordinarily exciting, devilishly clever, cunningly mysterious, and have Sherlock Holmes teaming up with one or more occult detectives? Then read on, for today we have the serious details on pitches, pay and plans. And supernatural fiction historian (and writer) Tim Prasil<\/strong><\/span> calls by to suggest a few characters.<\/p>\n

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As we said in our last article, John Linwood Grant<\/strong><\/span> is editing the Sherlock Holmes and the Occult Detectives<\/em> anthology for Belanger Books. JLG is the author of both Holmes stories and occult detective stories – even the two at once occasionally, as part of his \u2018Tales of the Last Edwardian\u2019<\/em> series. And as a harassed writer, he also knows that what you really want to hear right now is How Long, How Much, and When. Let\u2019s get those out of the way before we explain exactly what\u2019s required.<\/p>\n

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Sherlock Holmes and the Occult Detectives<\/h1>\n

Belanger Books<\/h3>\n

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Core concept:<\/strong> A 5,000 – 10,000 word traditional Sherlock Holmes and occult detective \u201cteam up\u201d story.<\/p>\n

Payment:<\/strong> Authors shall receive a payment of $50 plus a percentage of the Kickstarter project profits (expected minimum payment of $100), and a paperback copy of the anthology.<\/p>\n

Rights:<\/strong> Authors shall retain rights to their work. We only retain the rights to the story within the publication.<\/p>\n

Pitch Deadline:<\/strong> March 15, 2019<\/p>\n

Submission Deadline:<\/strong> July 15, 2019<\/p>\n

Note:<\/strong> Kickstarter will run in November 2019 and publication of book will occur in December 2019.<\/p>\n

\n

What We Want<\/h2>\n

This bit is detailed, not because it\u2019s a terribly complex idea, but because it all increases the chances of us taking your story. And it has a few hints. The more in tune with us you are, the more we\u2019ll wag our tails when we read your submission. If you\u2019re confident that you\u2019ve already grasped the concept, or you\u2019re an experienced writer, you might decide to use it just to double-check. We\u2019d still prefer you read it through.<\/p>\n

We want stories which have all<\/strong> the following – four straightforward key elements:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Sherlock Holmes (and\/or Watson) as a key protagonist; a proper, authentic Conan Doyle-type Holmes, in full character.<\/em><\/li>\n
  2. One or more occult detectives, as the other key protagonist(s), ones who could have taken up a case at the same time as Holmes was alive and functioning. This means Public Domain figures from around 1875 \u2013 1925* OR your own original character operating in the same time period. These are also encouraged.
    \n<\/strong><\/span><\/em><\/li>\n
  3. A strong supernatural, paranormal, occult, psychic or other ab-natural element which is crucial to the story. As mentioned last time, you CAN try a \u2018debunking\u2019 tale, where a mundane explanation ensues, but we won\u2019t take many of those.<\/em><\/li>\n
  4. An actual case\/investigation \u2013 not Holmes and Carnacki happening to see a ghost pass by, whilst they argue about camera techniques over coffee.<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    We do not want time-travel stories or steampunk – or Lovecraftiana, unless the latter is very clever, subtle and original, in which case we might have a glance. Think Algernon Blackwood, William Hope Hodgson, Arthur Machen, L T Meade<\/strong> and so on. Late Victorian, Edwardian and Twenties scariness.<\/p>\n

    * Do check the occult detective is in the Public Domain. Seventy years after the author\u2019s death is the usual rule-of-thumb, except for some important characters where an Estate is still active and protecting its copyrights. Conan Doyle and Agatha Christie, for example.<\/em><\/p>\n

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    The Pitch<\/h2>\n

    It\u2019s possible to do this sort of thing and end up with blocks of similar stories, however well written they are. Seventeen cases where Holmes and Dr Hesselius prove that the apparition at Gruntling Hall was in fact the butler in a sheet (but that the family was genuinely cursed anyway, because a wicked ancestor ate cheese too late at night). Or ten cases of werewolves, phosphorescent pain and missing boots.<\/p>\n

    For this anthology, we would like short pitches \u2013 say a hundred to two hundred words or so (the paragraph above is seventy words, as an example) \u2013 telling us about your planned story:<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. The decade and general physical setting(s), e.g. London; a decaying Cornish farmhouse, before WWI; a fancy hotel in Paris.<\/em><\/li>\n
    2. The sort of supernatural threat\/mystery, e.g. classic ghostly appearances; physical monstrosity on the loose; madman possessed by something; cursed item. Get us intrigued.<\/em><\/li>\n
    3. The occult detective(s) involved, e.g. Van Helsing late in his career; John Bell having decided spirits do exist; Carnacki at his wits end and needing a co-conspirator.<\/em><\/li>\n
    4. A hint of plot, to show you have a story broadly in mind.<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      If you\u2019ve never pitched before, have a go at it, and we\u2019ll tell you if you have something there which we think is worth pursuing. If you\u2019ve done it before, you know the drill.<\/p>\n

      The authors of the pitches we like will be invited to write up a full submission for possible inclusion, so you’ll then have a further three months. No guarantees, but it means that you\u2019re at least on the right lines, so your chances go up.<\/p>\n

      PITCHES ONLY TO<\/strong> occultholmes@virginmedia.com<\/a> BY 15TH MARCH, PLEASE<\/strong><\/p>\n

      \n

      The Occult Detectives (aka The Doomed Meddlers)<\/h2>\n

      No, they\u2019re not always doomed, we just like the term. They risk their lives, their sanity or their bank balances in the investigation of the dark and mysterious. Holmes you should already know, but what about the characters he will work with here? You have a wide range of possibilities open to you, and yes, we may well take more than one team-up with the same occult detectives (from different authors), if the stories are that good.<\/p>\n

      \"occult<\/a><\/p>\n

      We hand over for a moment to Tim Prasil, a keen anthologist of early supernatural stories and the creator of Vera van Slyke, his own dauntless investigator\u2026<\/p>\n

      Prasil on Paranormal Protagonists<\/h2>\n

      Some fictional occult detectives contemporary with Sherlock Holmes are well-recognized: William Hope Hodgson\u2019s Thomas Carnacki and Algernon Blackwood\u2019s John Silence lead the team with Arthur Machen\u2019s Dyson and Richard Marsh\u2019s Augustus Champnell close behind. However, there are lesser known characters who, were they to cross paths with Holmes, might result in an interesting adventure. Were one to ask me to name my Top Five Lesser-Known Occult Detectives Contemporary with Sherlock Holmes, I would gladly name them\u2014even if the one asking had a chronic infatuation with a dog-deer crossbreed known as \u201clurchers.\u201d<\/p>\n

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      1. We start with the hazy and unnamed investigator in H.G. Wells\u2019 \u201cThe Red Room\u201d (1896). What brought him to Lorraine Castle to investigate its fearful Red Room? What is his relationship to the young Duke, the unfortunate fellow who \u201chad begun his dying\u201d after merely opening the door to the Red Room? We know Wells\u2019 protagonist arrives as a skeptic (as do others on my list), so how does his experience change him?<\/li>\n
      2. While we\u2019re on the subject of potentially converted skeptics, let\u2019s consider Lady Julie Spinner, a promising character in a disappointing novella by an anonymous author. The piece is titled \u201cWanted\u2014An Explanation\u201d (1881), wherein Lady Julie says, \u201cI have been a hunter of ghosts all my life, and have never been able even to meet with a single person who has seen one.\u201d However, after being stymied by the strange events at Hunt House, does her view of the boundaries of reality expand?<\/li>\n
      3. From Lady Spinner, we move to Lord Syfret. The adventures of this serial character might be a bit tough to locate, but Arabella Kenealy\u2019s series of short stories titled Some of Lord Syfret\u2019s Experiences<\/i> has been reprinted by Coachwhip Press. That is, seven of them appear in that reprint, and one source reports that eleven tales appeared in Ludgate<\/i> magazine in 1896 and 1897. Here\u2019s a borderline occult detective that\u2019s awaiting a full resurrection by a literary detective, if not a creative writer.<\/li>\n
      4. Enough with the nobility\u2014let\u2019s look at a duo that beat Mulder and Scully by roughly a century. Miss Erristoun and Mr. Calder-Maxwell investigate the title room in Lettice Galbraith\u2019s \u201cThe Blue Room\u201d (1897). The story is remarkably Victorian in that Miss Erristoun is reduced from a gutsy rebel to a wilting maiden-in-distress (one who marries the man she earlier waved off as wanting to tame her). But what if that marriage crumbled quickly, and she rejoined the scholarly Calder-Maxwell to investigate other cases of ghosts-that-aren\u2019t-really-ghosts-at-all?<\/li>\n
      5. I end with what would amount to a crossover of Arthur Conan Doyle and Arthur Conan Doyle. Dr. Hardacre, in ACD\u2019s \u201cThe Brown Hand\u201d (1899), is a doctor whose hobby is psychical research and who, upon solving his rich uncle\u2019s otherworldly problem, winds up in a very nice position to make probing occult mysteries his full-time job. No doubt, he and Dr. Watson might have a jolly time debating diagnoses: demon possession or delirium tremens\u2014lycanthropy or laryngitis?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

        \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

        Links to all of these stories\u2014except the mildly elusive Lord Syfret ones\u2014can be found on either the Chronological Bibliography of Early Occult Detectives<\/em> or the Legacy of Ghost Hunter Fiction<\/em> bibliographies at my Brom Bones Books website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

        \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

        \n

        We have our own set of perhaps lesser known potential characters, such as:<\/p>\n