Lord Darcy (fiction)
Encyclopedia
Lord Darcy is a detective
in an alternate history
, created by Randall Garrett
. The first stories were asserted to take place in the same year as they were published, but in a world very different from our own.
Darcy is described in The Spell of War as an 18-year-old lieutenant in the autumn of the War of '39, so he was born in 1921 or late 1920, and he is in his early forties when we first encounter him as a detective.
How he comes to be addressed as a "Lord" is never explained, though he seems deferential when dealing with other Peers such as Dukes, Counts, and a Marquis. In Too Many Magicians
Darcy is said to be a cousin of the Marquis of London.
Black magic is not a categorically different type of magic, but a matter of symbolism and intent—at least in the Anglo-French sphere, as the Kingdom of Italy requests extradition of a woman for black magic when her actual offense was no more than unlicensed magic. However, the effect of symbolism and intent can be substantial; one character, a Witch-Smeller, is capable of detecting its effects on the black magician and his victims.
Although magic is a central part of all the stories, none of the murders Lord Darcy investigates are directly caused by magic. All the homicides are committed by mundane means.
and the British Isles
are combined into a single state as the Anglo-French Empire, whilst Russia
, Italy
, and Germany
continue as loose collections of small states. Society is stratified—most important government positions are held by nobles, who dispense justice and still maintain private soldiers. The Church is powerful and a central component of everyone's life (there had never been a Reformation
, or it took a very different form, as some of the worst abuses of the late-Medieval/Renaissance Catholic Church seem to have been eliminated or minimized). However, serfdom is as dead as in our own world, and the rights of the common people appear to be as well protected as in our world's Western democracies, if in different ways.
Anglo-French regard themselves as fortunate in comparison to the subjects of the Polish
King, who are reported to be living under a terrible tyranny. The characters expressing this are all living in the Anglo-French countries, but include a Polish refugee, whom the Italian government accused of black magic, and who is compelled to spy for Poland by a threat to her uncle.
. Most mechanical devices are approximately those of our Victorian era
. Characters travel by horse-drawn carriage and steam train and employ revolving pistols and bolt action rifles; buildings are illuminated with gas lights. An electric torch, with magical parts, is "a fantastic device, a secret of His Majesty's Government." Messages can be sent by an electrical device called the "teleson", but the principles by which it operates are not well understood, and the technology to lay teleson lines underwater, or over water, has not yet been developed, so it is impossible to communicate across the Channel. Food is sometimes preserved in icebox
es; a magical "food preservator" has been invented, although preservators are expensive and rare because the stasis spell they employ is expensive to maintain, requiring the services of a specialist Journeyman or Master-grade magician. Sorcery is commonly employed in murder investigations, in much the same fashion as forensic science in our own world. Medical technology is not as advanced as in our world, because Healers are so effective, indeed the use of drugs with a genuine but non-magical benefit ("may cover a wound with moldy bread
... or give a patient with heart trouble a tea brewed of foxglove
") is regarded as little more than superstition.
, which dynasty has continued to rule (and which continues to use the Palace of Westminster
as a royal residence, with Parliament
far weaker than in our timeline). Richard I
returned to England after being wounded at the siege of Chaluz
, but recovered and ruled well, whilst John Lackland never held the throne and died in exile. Richard died in 1219 and was succeeded by his nephew Arthur
. Seven-hundred-fifty years later the present king is "John IV, by the Grace of God, King and Emperor of England, France, Scotland, Ireland [all the Anglo-French Empire], New England [North America], and New France [South America]; Defender of the Faith, et cetera".
To judge by the Irishman who has a central role in the stories, the Irish in this timeline do not feel particularly oppressed under the Anglo-French throne and have no inclination to become independent. Irish history here seems to have been spared traumatic periods of foreign colonisation and dispossession—and since everybody is Catholic, this Ireland has no problems of rival religious-ethnic communities.
The king is also Holy Roman Emperor
, exercising loose sovereignty over the many small German and Italian states. However, his actual exercise of sovereignty is limited by the ability of German states to call upon the Poles
for help; the chronologically first Lord Darcy story (though not the first written) takes place during a military confrontation between Anglo-French and Polish forces on the soil of Bavaria
.
In Italy
the King-Emperor is more of a Constitutional monarch
, with an Italian Parliament seemingly holding much more power than the one in London (in a story set in Italy, a local policeman emphasizes that his oath of office is to the Parliament rather than the King). There is no mention, however, of whether the parliament is appointed or elected, and by whom.
Poland is a major power and the chief rival of the Anglo-French, and the two exist in a situation of Cold War
; some of the stories are spy thrillers, where Lord Darcy is pitted against Polish agents and takes on some of the attributes of James Bond
(with some magic ingredients added, such as a spell used to make him fall madly in love with a beautiful female Polish agent).
Hungary is part of the Polish Empire (the University of Buda-Pest is mentioned as one of Poland's major institutes of learning), and the empire seems to extend southwards into the Balkans. It is stated that Kiev is part of the Polish Empire, and most of the Ukrainian steppe. The Russias are no more than a set of fractious statelets, which might unify in the face of Polish aggression but as yet have failed to do so (it had been close to that situation in some periods of our own history—see Polish-Muscovite War (1605–1618)
).
The main strategy of the Anglo-French is to bottle up the Poles and deny them access to the world's oceans. There is mention of a war in the 1940s (roughly equivalent to World War II
, but of a much more limited extent) in which the Polish Navy was decisively beaten. Since then, an alliance with the Scandinavians
at the exit from the Baltic
and with the Roumelians (Byzantines
) at the exit from the Black Sea
denies passage to Polish warships—though they try to circumvent this blockade and build an ocean-going navy with the help of some Africa
n states.
As noted, the Byzantine Empire
continues to exist and is, at least at times, an Anglo-French ally, but is a minor power corresponding to our Greece, its main importance being the control of the strategic Dardanelles
. The Osmanlis rule a realm beyond it, apparently never having spread beyond Anatolia
. The Kingdoms of Castile
and Aragon
never united into a single Spanish realm and were never of much account, and Southern Spain is still part of the Muslim world (one story features a suave Muslim from Granada
residing in London).
Since the Point of Departure which set this alternate history off is the survival of Richard the Lion Heart until 1219 and his success in eliminating the Capetians
and making himself King of France, presumably in this history The Fourth Crusade of 1204 which fatally crippled the Byzantine Empire never took place. And with John Lackland never taking the throne, he never had a chance to behave tyrannically as a king, and therefore there was no rebellion culminating in the Magna Carta
—which may (very partially) explain the lack of any democratic institutions in this Twentieth Century. (By which Garrett may have meant to imply that the villains of history sometimes have their uses.)
Mexico
(Mechicoe in Anglo-French) is still ruled by Aztecs, headed by the Christianised descendants of Montezuma
, having been taken into the empire's high nobility and possessing considerable autonomy. North America (the whole of which is called "New England") is in the process of being settled by Europeans, but the process is far less advanced than in our history, with Native American
tribes in the 1960s still able to offer significant resistance to whites encroaching on their land. However, there is also mention of thriving tobacco plantations, which seems to indicate that the equivalent of the US South is more thickly settled than the North.
Little is mentioned of "New France" (South America) beyond a single mention of its jungles being a punitive posting to unruly soldiers, from which it is clear that native inhabitants are far from completely subdued there, either.
There are only few references to Africa
. Lord Darcy's father, who was an army "coronel" (i.e. colonel
), is mentioned as having fought in a war at Sudan
(which might be not exactly the same as our timeline's state of this name). In West Africa
, black states are mentioned as maintaining their independence, keeping a balance between the Anglo-French and the Poles, and possessing enough technology to equip modern warships. The impression given is that Africa was not as heavily touched by colonialism
as in our timeline. (Presumably, because the Anglo-French have a whole continent at their disposal on the other side of the Atlantic, and they do their best to bar Polish access.)
Lord Darcy is Chief Criminal Investigator for Prince Richard, Duke of Normandy—the brother of the king. An Englishman, he lives in Rouen
, but spends very little time there. His assistant is Master Sean O'Lochlainn, a sorcerer who undertakes magical forensic work and who is highly proud of Irish
magic and its superiority to those of other countries (especially to Polish magic).
Too Many Magicians
is the only Lord Darcy novel written by Randall Garrett: it first appeared in Analog magazine from August to November 1966 and was issued in book form by Doubleday in 1967. This was followed by two short story collections: Murder and Magic (1979), and Lord Darcy Investigates (1981), containing stories that had appeared in Analog, Fantastic and other magazines. Garrett's extended illness and death prevented him from writing more Lord Darcy tales as he had intended.
Two more Lord Darcy novels, Ten Little Wizards (1988), and A Study in Sorcery (1989), were written by Garrett's friend Michael Kurland
after Garrett's death—the two names manifestly modeled on those of famous detective novels by, respectively, Agatha Christie
and Arthur Conan Doyle
, as that of Too Many Magicians was modeled on a famous novel by Rex Stout
(whose Nero Wolfe
and Archie Goodwin
have counterparts in the novel's universe in the Marquis de London and his Special Investigator, Lord Bontriomphe).
It seems likely that Kurland's Lord Darcy is younger than Garrett's, as Kurland has him graduating from Oxford in 1954, when he would have been 33 years old according to Garrett.
In 1999, Randall Garrett won the Sidewise Award for Alternate History
Special Achievement Award for the Lord Darcy series.
, an identification reinforced by his sidekick Lord Bontriomphe (whose name is a literal French translation of "Goodwin"
) and his cook Frederique Bruleur (corresponding to Wolfe's cook Fritz Brenner). The title, furthermore, echoes Wolfe novels Too Many Cooks
(1938), Too Many Women
(1947) and Too Many Clients
(1960). That novel also contains a number of punning references to The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
. More subtly, the murder victim, a famous Master Sorcerer named Sir James Zwinge, is named for Randall James Zwinge, better known as the stage magician James Randi
; and the head of the magician's guild is Sir Lyon Gandolphus Gray, whose name is partially a reference to Gandalf
from J.R.R. Tolkien and partially that of fantasy
author Lyon Sprague De Camp, and whose appearance as described partakes of both men's appearance http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/55/Time_and_Chance.jpg. In the short story "The Bitter End", a bumbling Sergeant-at-Arms is named Cougair Chasseur, a clear reference to Inspector Clouseau
of the Pink Panther movies. And in several stories there is a secret agent, Sir James le Lein (le lien is French for "bond"; a clear James Bond
reference).
The story "A Case Of Identity" also contains two subtle references to contract bridge
, including a magic spell for establishing identity called the Jacoby transfer
which requires blood from "at least two hearts." This is an allusion to a bridge convention
known as transfer bidding, which attempts to make the stronger, concealed hand the declarer, and can be carried out using the heart suit. Also in the story, the murder victim is described as having been struck with a long club, because "according to the Kaplan-Sheinwold
test, a short club cannot have been used." In the Kaplan-Sheinwold bidding system, making an opening bid of "one club" when holding three or fewer club cards—a "short club"—is not permitted.
The story "The Sixteen Keys" contains a reference to the "von Horst-Shea" process, whereby a person can maintain a lifelong youthful appearance, at the expense of a much shorter life, and a sudden dissolution at the end of it. This is done by a magical "balancing" of the body's processes, so that no one part of the body wears out before any other. This is a clear reference to the name of, and events in, Oliver Wendell Holmes'
poem, "The Wonderful One-Hoss Shay".
In two stories, Darcy encounters a magical reference to E.E. "Doc" Smith's Lensmen series: King's Messengers, couriers who identify themselves with a be-gemmed badge that glows red for its owner, and only its owner. The spell on the badge is said to be invented by magician Sir Edward Elmer in the Thirties, and to have remained secret ever since. "E.E." was short for Edward Elmer, and the badges are a reference to a device which preceded the Lens which gave the Lensmen their name.
Darcy himself resembles Sherlock Holmes in a number of ways. However, unlike Watson, whose primary purpose was to allow Holmes to explain his deductions, Sean O'Lochlainn is more of a counterpart than a foil. The relationship between the two is very similar to that of the suave, analytical Napoleon Solo
(Darcy) and technical expert Illya Kuryakin
(O'Lochlainn).
Sometime Garrett collaborator Michael Kurland
(who would himself write later Lord Darcy works, with the permission of Garrett's estate) appears as Sergeant-at-Arms Michael Coeur-Terre in Too Many Magicians; and in "A Case of Identity" the Marquise of Rouen, worried about her missing husband, is described as drinking herself into a stupor on "the best brandy, the St. Courlande-Michele." Similarly several books feature a magical theorist named Sir Thomas Leseaux, a play on another of Garrett's friends, the author and stage magician T. A. Waters.
The strong relation between Lord Darcy and Master Sean O'Lochlainn in some ways recalls that between Dorothy Sayers's Lord Peter Wimsey
and his servant Mervyn Bunter
. In both cases there is a successful detection team composed of a nobleman and a commoner, with a built-in social hierarchy tempered by a strong and long-lasting personal friendship; in both cases, the commoner partner is an extremely capable and competent person, highly appreciated by his socially-superior noble partner; and in both cases, the partnership started as a wartime relationship between an officer and an NCO, and carried over into civilian life.
Elizabeth Bear
, whose novel New Amsterdam is set in a (quite different) alternate timeline where magic works, acknowledged her debt to the Darcy stories by giving her protagonist, a forensic sorceress, the name Abigail Irene Garrett. http://www.elizabethbear.com/newamsterdam.html
Also: Michael Kurland's 1969 novel The Unicorn Girl
features protagonists who jump into a series of alternate timelines—and one of the timelines they land in is Lord Darcy's. However, while several minor characters from the Lord Darcy series appear in The Unicorn Girl, neither Lord Darcy nor Sean are featured.
Detective
A detective is an investigator, either a member of a police agency or a private person. The latter may be known as private investigators or "private eyes"...
in an alternate history
Alternate history (fiction)
Alternate history or alternative history is a genre of fiction consisting of stories that are set in worlds in which history has diverged from the actual history of the world. It can be variously seen as a sub-genre of literary fiction, science fiction, and historical fiction; different alternate...
, created by Randall Garrett
Randall Garrett
Randall Garrett was an American science fiction and fantasy author. He was a prolific contributor to Astounding and other science fiction magazines of the 1950s and 1960s...
. The first stories were asserted to take place in the same year as they were published, but in a world very different from our own.
Title character
Lord Darcy is the Chief Forensic Investigator for the Duke of Normandy, and sometime Special Investigator for the High Court of Chivalry. His full name is never given; he is always referred to by his title as the Lord of Arcy (i.e Lord d'Arcy or Lord Darcy), even by his friends. We are told that he speaks Anglo-French with an English accent, and that he dresses in the style of an English aristocrat. He thinks of himself as English and yet Arcy seems to be a French place name.Darcy is described in The Spell of War as an 18-year-old lieutenant in the autumn of the War of '39, so he was born in 1921 or late 1920, and he is in his early forties when we first encounter him as a detective.
How he comes to be addressed as a "Lord" is never explained, though he seems deferential when dealing with other Peers such as Dukes, Counts, and a Marquis. In Too Many Magicians
Too Many Magicians
Too Many Magicians is a novel by Randall Garrett, an American science fiction author. One of several stories starring Lord Darcy, it was first serialized in Analog Science Fiction in 1966 and published in book form the same year by Doubleday...
Darcy is said to be a cousin of the Marquis of London.
Magic
Magic is a codified scientific discipline, much involved with higher mathematics and possessed of theoretical and experimental underpinnings as sophisticated as those of our physics and chemistry. Licensed Sorcerers, possessed of the Talent and properly trained, achieve a wide range of effects. Healing by the laying on of hands is effective and a commonplace treatment for disease and injury; thanks to the efficacy of the Healers, it is common for people to live to the age of 100 and not rare for people to live to 125.Black magic is not a categorically different type of magic, but a matter of symbolism and intent—at least in the Anglo-French sphere, as the Kingdom of Italy requests extradition of a woman for black magic when her actual offense was no more than unlicensed magic. However, the effect of symbolism and intent can be substantial; one character, a Witch-Smeller, is capable of detecting its effects on the black magician and his victims.
Although magic is a central part of all the stories, none of the murders Lord Darcy investigates are directly caused by magic. All the homicides are committed by mundane means.
Social structure
FranceFrance
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
and the British Isles
British Isles
The British Isles are a group of islands off the northwest coast of continental Europe that include the islands of Great Britain and Ireland and over six thousand smaller isles. There are two sovereign states located on the islands: the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and...
are combined into a single state as the Anglo-French Empire, whilst Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
, Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
, and Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
continue as loose collections of small states. Society is stratified—most important government positions are held by nobles, who dispense justice and still maintain private soldiers. The Church is powerful and a central component of everyone's life (there had never been a Reformation
Protestant Reformation
The Protestant Reformation was a 16th-century split within Western Christianity initiated by Martin Luther, John Calvin and other early Protestants. The efforts of the self-described "reformers", who objected to the doctrines, rituals and ecclesiastical structure of the Roman Catholic Church, led...
, or it took a very different form, as some of the worst abuses of the late-Medieval/Renaissance Catholic Church seem to have been eliminated or minimized). However, serfdom is as dead as in our own world, and the rights of the common people appear to be as well protected as in our world's Western democracies, if in different ways.
Anglo-French regard themselves as fortunate in comparison to the subjects of the Polish
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
King, who are reported to be living under a terrible tyranny. The characters expressing this are all living in the Anglo-French countries, but include a Polish refugee, whom the Italian government accused of black magic, and who is compelled to spy for Poland by a threat to her uncle.
Education
Little is mentioned of education, although Oxford continues. Lord Darcy is mentioned as being a graduate of the fictional Magog College (1954). A fictional St. Thomas' Academy is also mentioned.Technology
Technology and physical sciences have suffered somewhat with the emphasis on magic. Physics has not been codified as a science; the one example of an investigator into the discipline is an eccentric on a par with the members of our own Flat Earth SocietyFlat Earth Society
The Flat Earth Society is an organization that seeks to further the belief that the Earth is flat instead of an oblate spheroid. The modern organization was founded by Englishman Samuel Shenton in 1956 and was later led by Charles K...
. Most mechanical devices are approximately those of our Victorian era
Victorian era
The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...
. Characters travel by horse-drawn carriage and steam train and employ revolving pistols and bolt action rifles; buildings are illuminated with gas lights. An electric torch, with magical parts, is "a fantastic device, a secret of His Majesty's Government." Messages can be sent by an electrical device called the "teleson", but the principles by which it operates are not well understood, and the technology to lay teleson lines underwater, or over water, has not yet been developed, so it is impossible to communicate across the Channel. Food is sometimes preserved in icebox
Icebox
An icebox is a compact non-mechanical refrigerator which was a common kitchen appliance before the development of safe powered refrigeration devices.- Design :...
es; a magical "food preservator" has been invented, although preservators are expensive and rare because the stasis spell they employ is expensive to maintain, requiring the services of a specialist Journeyman or Master-grade magician. Sorcery is commonly employed in murder investigations, in much the same fashion as forensic science in our own world. Medical technology is not as advanced as in our world, because Healers are so effective, indeed the use of drugs with a genuine but non-magical benefit ("may cover a wound with moldy bread
Penicillin
Penicillin is a group of antibiotics derived from Penicillium fungi. They include penicillin G, procaine penicillin, benzathine penicillin, and penicillin V....
... or give a patient with heart trouble a tea brewed of foxglove
Digitalis
Digitalis is a genus of about 20 species of herbaceous perennials, shrubs, and biennials that are commonly called foxgloves. This genus was traditionally placed in the figwort family Scrophulariaceae, but recent reviews of phylogenetic research have placed it in the much enlarged family...
") is regarded as little more than superstition.
International situation
The Anglo-French Empire was established by the PlantagenetsHouse of Plantagenet
The House of Plantagenet , a branch of the Angevins, was a royal house founded by Geoffrey V of Anjou, father of Henry II of England. Plantagenet kings first ruled the Kingdom of England in the 12th century. Their paternal ancestors originated in the French province of Gâtinais and gained the...
, which dynasty has continued to rule (and which continues to use the Palace of Westminster
Palace of Westminster
The Palace of Westminster, also known as the Houses of Parliament or Westminster Palace, is the meeting place of the two houses of the Parliament of the United Kingdom—the House of Lords and the House of Commons...
as a royal residence, with Parliament
Parliament
A parliament is a legislature, especially in those countries whose system of government is based on the Westminster system modeled after that of the United Kingdom. The name is derived from the French , the action of parler : a parlement is a discussion. The term came to mean a meeting at which...
far weaker than in our timeline). Richard I
Richard I of England
Richard I was King of England from 6 July 1189 until his death. He also ruled as Duke of Normandy, Duke of Aquitaine, Duke of Gascony, Lord of Cyprus, Count of Anjou, Count of Maine, Count of Nantes, and Overlord of Brittany at various times during the same period...
returned to England after being wounded at the siege of Chaluz
Château de Chalus-Chabrol
The Château de Chalus-Chabrol is a castle in the commune of Châlus in the département of Haute-Vienne, France.The castle dominates the town of Châlus...
, but recovered and ruled well, whilst John Lackland never held the throne and died in exile. Richard died in 1219 and was succeeded by his nephew Arthur
Arthur I, Duke of Brittany
Arthur I was Duke of Brittany between 1194 and 1202. He was the posthumous son of Geoffrey II, Duke of Brittany and Constance, Duchess of Brittany...
. Seven-hundred-fifty years later the present king is "John IV, by the Grace of God, King and Emperor of England, France, Scotland, Ireland [all the Anglo-French Empire], New England [North America], and New France [South America]; Defender of the Faith, et cetera".
To judge by the Irishman who has a central role in the stories, the Irish in this timeline do not feel particularly oppressed under the Anglo-French throne and have no inclination to become independent. Irish history here seems to have been spared traumatic periods of foreign colonisation and dispossession—and since everybody is Catholic, this Ireland has no problems of rival religious-ethnic communities.
The king is also Holy Roman Emperor
Holy Roman Emperor
The Holy Roman Emperor is a term used by historians to denote a medieval ruler who, as German King, had also received the title of "Emperor of the Romans" from the Pope...
, exercising loose sovereignty over the many small German and Italian states. However, his actual exercise of sovereignty is limited by the ability of German states to call upon the Poles
Poles
thumb|right|180px|The state flag of [[Poland]] as used by Polish government and diplomatic authoritiesThe Polish people, or Poles , are a nation indigenous to Poland. They are united by the Polish language, which belongs to the historical Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages of Central Europe...
for help; the chronologically first Lord Darcy story (though not the first written) takes place during a military confrontation between Anglo-French and Polish forces on the soil of Bavaria
Bavaria
Bavaria, formally the Free State of Bavaria is a state of Germany, located in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the largest state by area, forming almost 20% of the total land area of Germany...
.
In Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
the King-Emperor is more of a Constitutional monarch
Constitutional monarchy
Constitutional monarchy is a form of government in which a monarch acts as head of state within the parameters of a constitution, whether it be a written, uncodified or blended constitution...
, with an Italian Parliament seemingly holding much more power than the one in London (in a story set in Italy, a local policeman emphasizes that his oath of office is to the Parliament rather than the King). There is no mention, however, of whether the parliament is appointed or elected, and by whom.
Poland is a major power and the chief rival of the Anglo-French, and the two exist in a situation of Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
; some of the stories are spy thrillers, where Lord Darcy is pitted against Polish agents and takes on some of the attributes of James Bond
James Bond
James Bond, code name 007, is a fictional character created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short story collections. There have been a six other authors who wrote authorised Bond novels or novelizations after Fleming's death in 1964: Kingsley Amis,...
(with some magic ingredients added, such as a spell used to make him fall madly in love with a beautiful female Polish agent).
Hungary is part of the Polish Empire (the University of Buda-Pest is mentioned as one of Poland's major institutes of learning), and the empire seems to extend southwards into the Balkans. It is stated that Kiev is part of the Polish Empire, and most of the Ukrainian steppe. The Russias are no more than a set of fractious statelets, which might unify in the face of Polish aggression but as yet have failed to do so (it had been close to that situation in some periods of our own history—see Polish-Muscovite War (1605–1618)
Polish-Muscovite War (1605–1618)
The Polish–Muscovite War took place in the early 17th century as a sequence of military conflicts and eastward invasions carried out by the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, or the private armies and mercenaries led by the magnates , when the Russian Tsardom was torn into a series of civil wars, the...
).
The main strategy of the Anglo-French is to bottle up the Poles and deny them access to the world's oceans. There is mention of a war in the 1940s (roughly equivalent to World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, but of a much more limited extent) in which the Polish Navy was decisively beaten. Since then, an alliance with the Scandinavians
Scandinavians
Scandinavians are a group of Germanic peoples, inhabiting Scandinavia and to a lesser extent countries associated with Scandinavia, and speaking Scandinavian languages. The group includes Danes, Norwegians and Swedes, and additionally the descendants of Scandinavian settlers such as the Icelandic...
at the exit from the Baltic
Baltic Sea
The Baltic Sea is a brackish mediterranean sea located in Northern Europe, from 53°N to 66°N latitude and from 20°E to 26°E longitude. It is bounded by the Scandinavian Peninsula, the mainland of Europe, and the Danish islands. It drains into the Kattegat by way of the Øresund, the Great Belt and...
and with the Roumelians (Byzantines
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...
) at the exit from the Black Sea
Black Sea
The Black Sea is bounded by Europe, Anatolia and the Caucasus and is ultimately connected to the Atlantic Ocean via the Mediterranean and the Aegean seas and various straits. The Bosphorus strait connects it to the Sea of Marmara, and the strait of the Dardanelles connects that sea to the Aegean...
denies passage to Polish warships—though they try to circumvent this blockade and build an ocean-going navy with the help of some Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...
n states.
As noted, the Byzantine Empire
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...
continues to exist and is, at least at times, an Anglo-French ally, but is a minor power corresponding to our Greece, its main importance being the control of the strategic Dardanelles
Dardanelles
The Dardanelles , formerly known as the Hellespont, is a narrow strait in northwestern Turkey connecting the Aegean Sea to the Sea of Marmara. It is one of the Turkish Straits, along with its counterpart the Bosphorus. It is located at approximately...
. The Osmanlis rule a realm beyond it, apparently never having spread beyond Anatolia
Anatolia
Anatolia is a geographic and historical term denoting the westernmost protrusion of Asia, comprising the majority of the Republic of Turkey...
. The Kingdoms of Castile
Crown of Castile
The Crown of Castile was a medieval and modern state in the Iberian Peninsula that formed in 1230 as a result of the third and definitive union of the crowns and parliaments of the kingdoms of Castile and León upon the accession of the then King Ferdinand III of Castile to the vacant Leonese throne...
and Aragon
Aragon
Aragon is a modern autonomous community in Spain, coextensive with the medieval Kingdom of Aragon. Located in northeastern Spain, the Aragonese autonomous community comprises three provinces : Huesca, Zaragoza, and Teruel. Its capital is Zaragoza...
never united into a single Spanish realm and were never of much account, and Southern Spain is still part of the Muslim world (one story features a suave Muslim from Granada
Granada
Granada is a city and the capital of the province of Granada, in the autonomous community of Andalusia, Spain. Granada is located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada mountains, at the confluence of three rivers, the Beiro, the Darro and the Genil. It sits at an elevation of 738 metres above sea...
residing in London).
Since the Point of Departure which set this alternate history off is the survival of Richard the Lion Heart until 1219 and his success in eliminating the Capetians
House of Capet
The House of Capet, or The Direct Capetian Dynasty, , also called The House of France , or simply the Capets, which ruled the Kingdom of France from 987 to 1328, was the most senior line of the Capetian dynasty – itself a derivative dynasty from the Robertians. As rulers of France, the dynasty...
and making himself King of France, presumably in this history The Fourth Crusade of 1204 which fatally crippled the Byzantine Empire never took place. And with John Lackland never taking the throne, he never had a chance to behave tyrannically as a king, and therefore there was no rebellion culminating in the Magna Carta
Magna Carta
Magna Carta is an English charter, originally issued in the year 1215 and reissued later in the 13th century in modified versions, which included the most direct challenges to the monarch's authority to date. The charter first passed into law in 1225...
—which may (very partially) explain the lack of any democratic institutions in this Twentieth Century. (By which Garrett may have meant to imply that the villains of history sometimes have their uses.)
Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
(Mechicoe in Anglo-French) is still ruled by Aztecs, headed by the Christianised descendants of Montezuma
Moctezuma II
Moctezuma , also known by a number of variant spellings including Montezuma, Moteuczoma, Motecuhzoma and referred to in full by early Nahuatl texts as Motecuhzoma Xocoyotzin, was the ninth tlatoani or ruler of Tenochtitlan, reigning from 1502 to 1520...
, having been taken into the empire's high nobility and possessing considerable autonomy. North America (the whole of which is called "New England") is in the process of being settled by Europeans, but the process is far less advanced than in our history, with Native American
Indigenous peoples of the Americas
The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian inhabitants of North and South America, their descendants and other ethnic groups who are identified with those peoples. Indigenous peoples are known in Canada as Aboriginal peoples, and in the United States as Native Americans...
tribes in the 1960s still able to offer significant resistance to whites encroaching on their land. However, there is also mention of thriving tobacco plantations, which seems to indicate that the equivalent of the US South is more thickly settled than the North.
Little is mentioned of "New France" (South America) beyond a single mention of its jungles being a punitive posting to unruly soldiers, from which it is clear that native inhabitants are far from completely subdued there, either.
There are only few references to Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...
. Lord Darcy's father, who was an army "coronel" (i.e. colonel
Colonel
Colonel , abbreviated Col or COL, is a military rank of a senior commissioned officer. It or a corresponding rank exists in most armies and in many air forces; the naval equivalent rank is generally "Captain". It is also used in some police forces and other paramilitary rank structures...
), is mentioned as having fought in a war at Sudan
Sudan
Sudan , officially the Republic of the Sudan , is a country in North Africa, sometimes considered part of the Middle East politically. It is bordered by Egypt to the north, the Red Sea to the northeast, Eritrea and Ethiopia to the east, South Sudan to the south, the Central African Republic to the...
(which might be not exactly the same as our timeline's state of this name). In West Africa
West Africa
West Africa or Western Africa is the westernmost region of the African continent. Geopolitically, the UN definition of Western Africa includes the following 16 countries and an area of approximately 5 million square km:-Flags of West Africa:...
, black states are mentioned as maintaining their independence, keeping a balance between the Anglo-French and the Poles, and possessing enough technology to equip modern warships. The impression given is that Africa was not as heavily touched by colonialism
Colonialism
Colonialism is the establishment, maintenance, acquisition and expansion of colonies in one territory by people from another territory. It is a process whereby the metropole claims sovereignty over the colony and the social structure, government, and economics of the colony are changed by...
as in our timeline. (Presumably, because the Anglo-French have a whole continent at their disposal on the other side of the Atlantic, and they do their best to bar Polish access.)
Lord Darcy is Chief Criminal Investigator for Prince Richard, Duke of Normandy—the brother of the king. An Englishman, he lives in Rouen
Rouen
Rouen , in northern France on the River Seine, is the capital of the Haute-Normandie region and the historic capital city of Normandy. Once one of the largest and most prosperous cities of medieval Europe , it was the seat of the Exchequer of Normandy in the Middle Ages...
, but spends very little time there. His assistant is Master Sean O'Lochlainn, a sorcerer who undertakes magical forensic work and who is highly proud of Irish
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
magic and its superiority to those of other countries (especially to Polish magic).
Works
Despite the magical trappings, the Lord Darcy stories play fair as whodunnits; magic is never used to "cheat" a solution, and indeed, the mundane explanation is often obscured by the leap to assume a magical cause.Too Many Magicians
Too Many Magicians
Too Many Magicians is a novel by Randall Garrett, an American science fiction author. One of several stories starring Lord Darcy, it was first serialized in Analog Science Fiction in 1966 and published in book form the same year by Doubleday...
is the only Lord Darcy novel written by Randall Garrett: it first appeared in Analog magazine from August to November 1966 and was issued in book form by Doubleday in 1967. This was followed by two short story collections: Murder and Magic (1979), and Lord Darcy Investigates (1981), containing stories that had appeared in Analog, Fantastic and other magazines. Garrett's extended illness and death prevented him from writing more Lord Darcy tales as he had intended.
Two more Lord Darcy novels, Ten Little Wizards (1988), and A Study in Sorcery (1989), were written by Garrett's friend Michael Kurland
Michael Kurland
Michael Joseph Kurland is an American author, best known for his works of science fiction and detective fiction....
after Garrett's death—the two names manifestly modeled on those of famous detective novels by, respectively, Agatha Christie
Agatha Christie
Dame Agatha Christie DBE was a British crime writer of novels, short stories, and plays. She also wrote romances under the name Mary Westmacott, but she is best remembered for her 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections , and her successful West End plays.According to...
and Arthur Conan Doyle
Arthur Conan Doyle
Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle DL was a Scottish physician and writer, most noted for his stories about the detective Sherlock Holmes, generally considered a milestone in the field of crime fiction, and for the adventures of Professor Challenger...
, as that of Too Many Magicians was modeled on a famous novel by Rex Stout
Rex Stout
Rex Todhunter Stout was an American writer noted for his detective fiction. Stout is best known as the creator of the larger-than-life fictional detective Nero Wolfe, described by reviewer Will Cuppy as "that Falstaff of detectives." Wolfe's assistant Archie Goodwin recorded the cases of the...
(whose Nero Wolfe
Nero Wolfe
Nero Wolfe is a fictional detective, created in 1934 by the American mystery writer Rex Stout. Wolfe's confidential assistant Archie Goodwin narrates the cases of the detective genius. Stout wrote 33 novels and 39 short stories from 1934 to 1974, with most of them set in New York City. Wolfe's...
and Archie Goodwin
Archie Goodwin (fictional detective)
Archie Goodwin is a fictional character and detective in Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe mysteries. The witty voice of all the stories, he recorded the cases of the detective genius from 1934 to 1975 . He lives in Nero Wolfe's brownstone in New York City.Archie was born on October 23 in Chillicothe, Ohio,...
have counterparts in the novel's universe in the Marquis de London and his Special Investigator, Lord Bontriomphe).
It seems likely that Kurland's Lord Darcy is younger than Garrett's, as Kurland has him graduating from Oxford in 1954, when he would have been 33 years old according to Garrett.
In 1999, Randall Garrett won the Sidewise Award for Alternate History
Sidewise Award for Alternate History
The Sidewise Awards for Alternate History were established in 1995 to recognize the best alternate history stories and novels of the year.The awards take their name from the 1934 short story "Sidewise in Time" by Murray Leinster, in which a strange storm causes portions of Earth to swap places with...
Special Achievement Award for the Lord Darcy series.
Allusions
As in many of Garrett's other writings, he takes every opportunity to insert subtle, or otherwise, allusions to other fiction—in these stories there are many echoes of other classic, or otherwise, detectives. For example, in Too Many Magicians there is a cameo appearance by the Marquis de London, who looks and talks like Nero WolfeNero Wolfe
Nero Wolfe is a fictional detective, created in 1934 by the American mystery writer Rex Stout. Wolfe's confidential assistant Archie Goodwin narrates the cases of the detective genius. Stout wrote 33 novels and 39 short stories from 1934 to 1974, with most of them set in New York City. Wolfe's...
, an identification reinforced by his sidekick Lord Bontriomphe (whose name is a literal French translation of "Goodwin"
Archie Goodwin (fictional detective)
Archie Goodwin is a fictional character and detective in Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe mysteries. The witty voice of all the stories, he recorded the cases of the detective genius from 1934 to 1975 . He lives in Nero Wolfe's brownstone in New York City.Archie was born on October 23 in Chillicothe, Ohio,...
) and his cook Frederique Bruleur (corresponding to Wolfe's cook Fritz Brenner). The title, furthermore, echoes Wolfe novels Too Many Cooks
Too Many Cooks
Too Many Cooks is the fifth Nero Wolfe detective novel by American mystery writer Rex Stout. The story was serialized in The American Magazine before its publication in book form in 1938 by Farrar & Rinehart, Inc...
(1938), Too Many Women
Too Many Women
Too Many Women is a Nero Wolfe detective novel by Rex Stout, published in 1947 by the Viking Press. The novel was also collected in the omnibus volume All Aces .-Plot introduction:...
(1947) and Too Many Clients
Too Many Clients
Too Many Clients is a Nero Wolfe detective novel by Rex Stout, published by the Viking Press in 1960, and collected in the omnibus volume Three Aces .-Plot introduction:...
(1960). That novel also contains a number of punning references to The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
The Man from U.N.C.L.E. is an American television series that was broadcast on NBC from September 22, 1964, to January 15, 1968. It follows the exploits of two secret agents, played by Robert Vaughn and David McCallum, who work for a fictitious secret international espionage and law-enforcement...
. More subtly, the murder victim, a famous Master Sorcerer named Sir James Zwinge, is named for Randall James Zwinge, better known as the stage magician James Randi
James Randi
James Randi is a Canadian-American stage magician and scientific skeptic best known as a challenger of paranormal claims and pseudoscience. Randi is the founder of the James Randi Educational Foundation...
; and the head of the magician's guild is Sir Lyon Gandolphus Gray, whose name is partially a reference to Gandalf
Gandalf
Gandalf is a character in J. R. R. Tolkien's novels The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. In these stories, Gandalf appears as a wizard, member and later the head of the order known as the Istari, as well as leader of the Fellowship of the Ring and the army of the West...
from J.R.R. Tolkien and partially that of fantasy
Fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of fiction that commonly uses magic and other supernatural phenomena as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting. Many works within the genre take place in imaginary worlds where magic is common...
author Lyon Sprague De Camp, and whose appearance as described partakes of both men's appearance http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/55/Time_and_Chance.jpg. In the short story "The Bitter End", a bumbling Sergeant-at-Arms is named Cougair Chasseur, a clear reference to Inspector Clouseau
Inspector Clouseau
Chief Inspector Jacques Clouseau is a fictional character in Blake Edwards' The Pink Panther series. In most of the films, he was played by Peter Sellers, with one film in which he was played by Alan Arkin and one in which he was played by an uncredited Roger Moore...
of the Pink Panther movies. And in several stories there is a secret agent, Sir James le Lein (le lien is French for "bond"; a clear James Bond
James Bond
James Bond, code name 007, is a fictional character created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short story collections. There have been a six other authors who wrote authorised Bond novels or novelizations after Fleming's death in 1964: Kingsley Amis,...
reference).
The story "A Case Of Identity" also contains two subtle references to contract bridge
Contract bridge
Contract bridge, usually known simply as bridge, is a trick-taking card game using a standard deck of 52 playing cards played by four players in two competing partnerships with partners sitting opposite each other around a small table...
, including a magic spell for establishing identity called the Jacoby transfer
Jacoby transfer
The Jacoby transfer, or simply "transfers", in the card game contract bridge, is a convention initiated by responder following partner's notrump opening bid that requests opener rebid in the suit ranked just above that bid by responder, i.e...
which requires blood from "at least two hearts." This is an allusion to a bridge convention
Bridge convention
A bridge convention is a system of calls made during the auction phase of a contract bridge game which conveys a coded meaning about the players' card holdings...
known as transfer bidding, which attempts to make the stronger, concealed hand the declarer, and can be carried out using the heart suit. Also in the story, the murder victim is described as having been struck with a long club, because "according to the Kaplan-Sheinwold
Kaplan-Sheinwold
The Kaplan-Sheinwold bidding system was developed and popularized by Edgar Kaplan and Alfred Sheinwold during their partnership, which flourished during the 1950s and 1960s. K-S is one of many natural systems...
test, a short club cannot have been used." In the Kaplan-Sheinwold bidding system, making an opening bid of "one club" when holding three or fewer club cards—a "short club"—is not permitted.
The story "The Sixteen Keys" contains a reference to the "von Horst-Shea" process, whereby a person can maintain a lifelong youthful appearance, at the expense of a much shorter life, and a sudden dissolution at the end of it. This is done by a magical "balancing" of the body's processes, so that no one part of the body wears out before any other. This is a clear reference to the name of, and events in, Oliver Wendell Holmes'
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. was an American physician, professor, lecturer, and author. Regarded by his peers as one of the best writers of the 19th century, he is considered a member of the Fireside Poets. His most famous prose works are the "Breakfast-Table" series, which began with The Autocrat...
poem, "The Wonderful One-Hoss Shay".
In two stories, Darcy encounters a magical reference to E.E. "Doc" Smith's Lensmen series: King's Messengers, couriers who identify themselves with a be-gemmed badge that glows red for its owner, and only its owner. The spell on the badge is said to be invented by magician Sir Edward Elmer in the Thirties, and to have remained secret ever since. "E.E." was short for Edward Elmer, and the badges are a reference to a device which preceded the Lens which gave the Lensmen their name.
Darcy himself resembles Sherlock Holmes in a number of ways. However, unlike Watson, whose primary purpose was to allow Holmes to explain his deductions, Sean O'Lochlainn is more of a counterpart than a foil. The relationship between the two is very similar to that of the suave, analytical Napoleon Solo
Napoleon Solo
Napoleon Solo is a fictional character from the 1960s TV spy series The Man from U.N.C.L.E. The series was remarkable for pairing the American Solo, played by Robert Vaughn, and the Russian Illya Kuryakin as two spies who work together for an international espionage organisation at the height of...
(Darcy) and technical expert Illya Kuryakin
Illya Kuryakin
Illya Nickovetch Kuryakin is a fictional character from the 1960s TV spy series The Man from U.N.C.L.E..The series was remarkable for pairing an American Napoleon Solo and the Russian Kuryakin as two spies who work together for an international espionage organisation at the height of the Cold War...
(O'Lochlainn).
Sometime Garrett collaborator Michael Kurland
Michael Kurland
Michael Joseph Kurland is an American author, best known for his works of science fiction and detective fiction....
(who would himself write later Lord Darcy works, with the permission of Garrett's estate) appears as Sergeant-at-Arms Michael Coeur-Terre in Too Many Magicians; and in "A Case of Identity" the Marquise of Rouen, worried about her missing husband, is described as drinking herself into a stupor on "the best brandy, the St. Courlande-Michele." Similarly several books feature a magical theorist named Sir Thomas Leseaux, a play on another of Garrett's friends, the author and stage magician T. A. Waters.
The strong relation between Lord Darcy and Master Sean O'Lochlainn in some ways recalls that between Dorothy Sayers's Lord Peter Wimsey
Lord Peter Wimsey
Lord Peter Death Bredon Wimsey is a bon vivant amateur sleuth in a series of detective novels and short stories by Dorothy L. Sayers, in which he solves mysteries; usually, but not always, murders...
and his servant Mervyn Bunter
Mervyn Bunter
Mervyn Bunter is a fictional character in Dorothy L. Sayers' novels and short stories featuring Lord Peter Wimsey.- Literary Background :Dorothy L...
. In both cases there is a successful detection team composed of a nobleman and a commoner, with a built-in social hierarchy tempered by a strong and long-lasting personal friendship; in both cases, the commoner partner is an extremely capable and competent person, highly appreciated by his socially-superior noble partner; and in both cases, the partnership started as a wartime relationship between an officer and an NCO, and carried over into civilian life.
Elizabeth Bear
Elizabeth Bear
Sarah Bear Elizabeth Wishnevsky is an American author. Writing under the name Elizabeth Bear, she works primarily in the genre of speculative fiction, and was a winner of the 2005 John W...
, whose novel New Amsterdam is set in a (quite different) alternate timeline where magic works, acknowledged her debt to the Darcy stories by giving her protagonist, a forensic sorceress, the name Abigail Irene Garrett. http://www.elizabethbear.com/newamsterdam.html
Short stories
- "The Eyes Have It" (1964)
- "A Case of Identity" (1964)
- "The Muddle of the Woad" (1965)
- "A Stretch of the Imagination" (1973)
- "Matter of Gravity" (1974)
- "The Ipswich Phial" (1976)
- "The Sixteen Keys" (1976)
- "The Bitter EndThe Bitter End (short story)The Bitter End is a short story by Randall Garrett featuring his alternate history detective Lord Darcy and magician Master Sean. It was first published in Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine and has been included in the second edition of the collection Lord Darcy.The Lord Darcy stories are set...
" (1978) - "The Napoli Express" (1979)
- "The Spell of War" (1979)
Novels by Michael Kurland
- Ten Little Wizards (1988, ISBN 0-441-80057-2)
- A Study in Sorcery (1989, ISBN 0-441-79092-5)
Also: Michael Kurland's 1969 novel The Unicorn Girl
The Unicorn Girl
The Unicorn Girl is a science fiction novel by Michael Kurland originally released in 1969.-Plot introduction:The novel is the second part of the Greenwich Village Trilogy, with Chester Anderson writing the first book and the third volume written by T.A...
features protagonists who jump into a series of alternate timelines—and one of the timelines they land in is Lord Darcy's. However, while several minor characters from the Lord Darcy series appear in The Unicorn Girl, neither Lord Darcy nor Sean are featured.
Collections
- Murder and Magic (1979, ISBN 0-441-54541-6) contains short stories 1, 2, 3, and 4
- Lord Darcy Investigates (1981, ISBN 0-441-49142-1) contains short stories 5, 6, 7, and 9
- Lord DarcyLord Darcy (omnibus)Lord Darcy is a 1983 omnibus collection of two previous fantasy collections and one fantasy novel by Randall Garrett featuring his alternate history detective Lord Darcy, published by Doubleday as a selection in its Science Fiction Book Club. The component books had originally been published in...
(1983) omnibus edition containing:- Murder and Magic (see above)
- Too Many Magicians (see above)
- Lord Darcy Investigates (see above)
- Lord DarcyLord Darcy (omnibus)Lord Darcy is a 1983 omnibus collection of two previous fantasy collections and one fantasy novel by Randall Garrett featuring his alternate history detective Lord Darcy, published by Doubleday as a selection in its Science Fiction Book Club. The component books had originally been published in...
2002 edition (ISBN 0-7434-7184-9)- Includes all ten short stories, and Too Many Magicians.
External links
- Listing on SciFanSciFanSciFan is an online database for fans of science fiction and fantasy books.The site provides detailed bibliographies, linking books together into series' where appropriate and, in turn, grouping series by universe...
- Usenet - Rec.arts.sf.written: Postings 5-40 and 105-108. "References in Lord Darcy (was Purple's name....)", April–May 1999