Characters from the Diogenes Club series by Kim Newman.
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Club Members and Associates
Victorian
Charles Beauregard
One of the Club's top agents in Victorian times, and Chairman after Mycroft Holmes. An alternate version of him is a major character in Newman's Anno Dracula series.
- Crusading Widower: Lost his wife to childbirth in India years ago. To make matters worse, he was told the doctors could save either the baby or his wife; in choosing, he hesitated just long enough that neither made it.
- Gentleman Adventurer: Chivalrous, polite, and a badass Victorian secret agent.
- Occult Detective: His vocation.
- Inadequate Inheritor: "Sorcerer Conjuror Wizard Witch" deals with his worries that he's this to Mycroft. However, it seems Mycroft had every confidence in him.
Kate Reed
A journalist who often works with Beauregard. The character is originally from an unused manuscript of Bram Stoker's Dracula; an alternate version of her appears in Newman's Anno Dracula series.
- Good Bad Girl: Has had more sexual partners than would be seemly in Victorian London, if news were to get out.
- Intrepid Reporter: Shows a lot of courage following Beauregard into danger, even though she can't report on most of it.
- Oireland: Goes to lengths to try and conceal her accent, and comes from a Protestant family with strong republican sympathies.
- Smitten Teenage Girl: Was this for Charles when they first met, and is infuriated to realize she's still basically this as an adult. It's probably not meant to be, since Charles can't get over his dead wife.
- The Suffragette: Passionate about women's suffrage, along with other causes.
Mycroft Holmes
Founder and inaugural chairman of the Diogenes Club. You might be more familiar with his more famous younger brother.
- Large and in Charge: Noticeably overweight, and head of the Club.
- Our Founder: He's got a big portrait at the Club and everything.
- Public Domain Character: Best known from the Sherlock Holmes story "The Greek Interpreter".
- The Spymaster: He only bloody invented British intelligence! Decades before the British government "officially" set up any actual agencies devoted to it, yet.
Interbellum
Edwin Winthrop
One of the Club's top agents in the early 20th century, World War I veteran, and Charles Beauregard's protégé. An alternate, somewhat grimmer version of him appears in The Bloody Red Baron.
- Agent Scully: Approaches most cases with healthy skepticism, but since he's seen the supernatural firsthand, he can be easily persuaded when it's obviously at work.
- Ace Pilot: This was his job during World War I. Still has the plane.
- Expy: Sometimes he seems to be one for Nick Charles, if Nick hunted ghosts.
- Killed Off for Real: As a result of using black magic to bring down the Axis powers, he is, it seems, Dragged Off to Hell by the ghosts of those who died in the bombing of Hiroshima.
Catriona Kaye
Edwin's partner, both on Club business and in more private matters. Later becomes the first ever female chairperson of the Club's Ruling Cabal.
- Affectionate Nickname: Edwin calls her "Catty-Kit".
- Agent Mulder: Even though she spends a lot of time debunking phony psychics and mediums, she seems more committed to the study of magic than Edwin and has written several books on the subject.
- Breaking the Glass Ceiling: First Chairwoman of the Club's Ruling Cabal.
- Expy: Sometimes she seems to be one for Nora Charles, if Nora hunted ghosts.
- Occult Detective: Possibly even more so than Edwin, she writes books on the occult and spends her free time exposing phony psychics.
- Promoted to Parent: The closest thing Richard Jeperson had to a mother.
- Significant Birthdate: Cat's a century baby, born January 1, 1900.
1960s
Richard Jeperson
One of the Club's top agents in the 1970s.
- Ambiguously Brown: Suspected to be of Romani descent, possibly explaining how he ended up in that concentration camp.
- The Dandy: Richard has fully embraced the gaudiest and most flamboyant of 70s fashion. The end of the 70s did not make him recant.
- Expy: Based heavily on Jason King from Department S; cover pictures of him tend to look like Peter Wyngarde.
- Last of His Kind: The Club is shut down sometime in the 70s or 80s, leaving Richard the only member whose whereabouts are known though it remains possible that Vanessa is still running the club in secret.
- Mysterious Past: He was discovered as a small child in a Nazi concentration camp, and taken in by club member Geoffrey Jeperson. He doesn't remember anything before that, and likely isn't too eager to find out.
- Psychic Powers: He is empathic and possibly a bit psychometric.
- Retired Badass: By the time of "Swellhead", which opens on his Mandatory Unretirement.
Vanessa
Richard's partner. Implied to become Chairman of the Diogenes Club at some point in the future.
Fred Regent
Richard's policeman pal. First appears in "The End of Pier Show"
- Friend on the Force: for Richard.
- Mistaken for Subculture: Adopted the skinhead look while investigating a neo-Nazi gang. After that case, he decided to stick with the look to see if he could redeem it.
Others
Derek Leech
A multimedia tycoon who is quite possibly also the devil incarnate, or something close enough. His desire is to plunge the world into shallow consumerist darkness. Originally a character in Newman's novel The Quorum.
- The Bad Guy Wins: The final segments of "Seven Stars" show his influence finally extended across the globe, creating a shallow, consumerist borderline-cyberpunk dystopia. He finds it's not as fun as he thought.
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: A borderline demonic entity who intends for his products to turn humanity into a consumeristic, overweight, low-attention-span-having proles.
- Generic Doomsday Villain: He literally has no origin. He simply crawled out of the slime in the Thames one day wanting to spread his personal brand of evil.
- Greater-Scope Villain: Has his own evil schemes for the human race, but they're not as immediate as all the other villains, so the Club rarely gets the chance to confront him directly.
- Legacy Character: He is the most recent in a long line of evil "Great Enchanters", though unlike his predecessors, he prefers using corporate media rather than black magic.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: He is a hybrid of Richard Branson (his Sixties and Seventies role as a music executive) and Rupert Murdoch (his Eighties and Nineties role as a media magnate). There are also occasional references to the lives of other charismatic UK business tycoon.
- Pragmatic Villainy: More interested in gaining cultural influence than ending the world.
The Undertaking
A secretive organization working for the British government (at least, when they feel like it), whose agents all wear dark suits and smoked glasses. Their remit seems to be discretely tracking and apprehending supernatural creatures, which sometimes puts them at odds with the Diogenes Club.
- Ambiguously Human: There's something disturbing under those smoked glasses they wear. Beauregard's so spooked by it that he won't mention it in an internal narration.
- Creepy Good: There's definitely something sinister about them, and Beauregard is convinced they're not quite as loyal to the British government as they want you to think. But they mostly have the same interests as the Diogenes Club.
- Expy: Doctor Who fans might think of them as the Torchwood to Diogenes' UNIT.
- Interservice Rivalry: Relations are tense between the Undertaking and the Club. They can be persuaded to work together, but only in apocalyptic scenarios.
- The Men in Black: But dressed as Victorian undertakers. Their use of "Mr. [letter]" codenames references the movie of the same name.
- Museum of the Strange and Unusual: Their home base, the Mausoleum. Though it would be equally accurate to call it a Fantastic Nature Preserve or an Extranormal Prison.
- Punny Name: Dress as undertakers, and are called "The Undertaking".
The Unnameables
America's answer to the Diogenes Club, best known for their involvement with some unpleasantness at Devil Reef near Innsmouth, Massachusetts. Unnamables appear in "Big Fish" and "Moon Moon Moon".
- Distaff Counterpart: Their agent Whitney Gauge (from "Moon Moon Moon") is almost a female Richard Jeperson.
- FBI Agent: Exact Words are in play here: they belong to a federal bureau of investigation, but not necessarily the one you're thinking of.
- Punny Name: Meant to evoke "The Untouchables" (Eliot Ness' law enforcement unit) and to sound like the kind of adjective H. P. Lovecraft would use.
Janice Marsh
A movie star known for her alluring but somewhat odd appearance. A descendant of one Obed Marsh, she was involved in a Diogenes case in southern California around 1942. Appears in "The Big Fish" and "Another Fish Story". Also gets mentioned in Newman's The Secrets of Drearcliff Grange School.
- Been There, Shaped History: Was acquainted with Charles Manson and may have contributed to his weird cult ideology.
- Evil Versus Oblivion: In "Another Fish Story", she's the Oblivion to Derek Leech's Evil.
- Fish People: If you've read Lovecraft's The Shadow Over Innsmouth, it becomes very obvious who/what she is.
- Uncanny Valley Girl: A movie star of renown, but one character can't help but think there's something off about her appearance.
The Splendid Six
A team of superheroes active in Edwardian England. Their roster consists of Blue Streak, Aviatrix, Blackfist, Lord Piltdown, the Mystic Maharaja, and Clever Dick. Introduced in "Clubland Heroes", with occasional references to their activities throughout the series.
- Ace Pilot: Aviatrix has this as her gimmick, but she grows her own wings.
- The Atoner: With the exception of Clever Dick, is seems some of them at least made attempts to make up for their murder of Peeter Blame.
- Broken Pedestal: They're kind of jerks to Cat and murderers or accessories to murder. Their popularity with he public wanes after a strange series of scandals.
- Captain Patriotic: All very British, though sometimes straying into Politically Incorrect Hero.
- Heroic Build: Seemingly averted. Clever Dick is a pudgy little kid, Aviatrix is barely five feet tall... Lord Piltdown comes the closest, but the yard-long arms and thick brow ridges get in the way.
- Proto-Superhero: Although they use straight superhero tropes, they are based on character archetypes from the early 20th century (Edisonade inventor, kid detective, WWI flying ace).
- Smug Super: They seem to be losing touch with the people they're supposed to be defending to the point of murdering an innocent- if annoying- civilian and covering it up.
- Super Team: If the Diogenes Club is SHIELD, the Six are the Avengers though they have more in common with the Seven from The Boys. Charles is not best pleased when the Six tries to treat the Club like a cleanup crew.
Richard Cleaver/"Clever Dick"
One of the Six, a genius kid detective. Decades after the events of "Clubland Heroes", he becomes the main antagonist in "Cold Snap".- Bratty Half-Pint: His existence is highly annoying to everyone he has to deal with.
- Diabolical Mastermind: Plots the end of the world by nuclear winter in "Cold Snap". It would be a Face–Heel Turn if his personality changed even a tiny bit.
- A Dick in Name: Outright stated in The Haunting of Drearcliff Grange School to be "not clever, just a dick".
- Elmer Fudd Syndrome: It's mentioned in "Cold Snap" that it's particularly unfortunate that he's named Richard, given he can't actually say it. When he's not ranting, the adult Richard is careful to avoid words with "R"s in them if at all possible.
- Embarrassing Nickname: During puberty, he was saddled with "Spotted Dick".
- Former Child Star: Gets very bitter after his career as "boy detective" ends. Enough to try and end the world.
- Kid Detective: One with just plain implausible powers of deduction.
- Know-Nothing Know-It-All: Much is made of his remarkable intelligence- even graduated near the top of his university class with a double major at age ten- yet he can't tell the difference between a actual Indian person and a white guy wearing burnt cork.
- Politically Incorrect Hero: As noted above, several of the Six have shades of this, but Dick in particular believes that their problems stem entirely from having a woman and an ethnic minority (or even someone who appears to be an ethnic minority) on the team.
- Super-Intelligence: His power, though sometimes it seems like his deductive genius has more to do with him always working with people too stupid to spot obvious clues.
The Mountmains
A family of Irish terrorists who have occasionally caused trouble for the Diogenes Club. Declan Mountmain, his nephew Bennett, Bennett's niece Maureen, and Maureen's daughter Mimsy are antagonists in "Seven Stars".
- Big, Screwed-Up Family: Evil sorcerer terrorists, natch.
- Bomb Throwing Anarchist: Don't have a handy evil artifact? Dynamite works.
- The Clan: They've caused generations of trouble for the Club.
- Dating Catwoman: Maureen Mountmain had sort of a thing with Richard Jeperson. It was to complete a magical ritual, not for fun; Maureen remains blasé about the whole thing and Richard is embarrassed by it.
- Evil Sorcerer: All seem to study black magic. In "Seven Stars", they're after the artifact that Moses used to bring down ancient Egypt, hoping to induce something similar with the British Empire.
- Western Terrorists: Declan, at least, was trying to free Ireland from British rule. His methods are far too extreme for anyone to sympathize with him, though.
- Fantastic Terrorists: And they also happen to dabble in black magic.
Mimsy Mountmain/"Seven Stars"
Modern day scion of the Mountmains. Is more or less the final antagonist of the novella "Seven Stars".- The Cracker: By the last segment of "Seven Stars", set some time in the future, she's become a cyberterrorist.
- Enfante Terrible: She was a terror as a child, driving her once-free-spirited mother to mental instability.
- MacGuffin Turned Human: Due to the ritual done on the night of her conception, she carries the Jewel of the Seven Stars within her. It's an Artifact of Doom, so this is a very bad thing.
