"In almost every legend or myth there is usually a magical device involved, whether it be a cloak of invisibility or an enchanted sword but you never know what happens to those objects when the story is over. The Wyrd Museum is where they end up, all the supernatural trinkets are kept there, safely away from the ordinary world, yet the strangest and perhaps most deadly elements are the three old ladies who live there..."
— Robin Jarvis
11-year-old Neil Chapman's ordinary life is turned upside down when his father takes a job as caretaker of the Wyrd Museum, a creepy building in the East End of London. The collection of peculiar (and often dangerous) artefacts is watched over by three eccentric old ladies known as the Webster sisters, who have lived there for centuries spinning the fates of mortals. Neil finds himself caught up in their affairs, being sent into the past with a talking teddy bear to change history and then battling an ancient evil determined to bring the sisters to ruin.
These books provide examples of:
- Aerith and Bob: Though they usually go by their more modern-sounding aliases, the true names of the Webster sisters are Urdr, Verdandi, and Skuld. The other main characters have typical names like Neil, Josh, and Edie.
- Angel Unaware: The barmy old tramp Tommy, who has an obsession with angels, turns out to actually be one.
- Bad People Abuse Animals: In what is quite possibly the most disturbing scene in the entire trilogy, a group of boys in World War II London stone a dachshund because it is a German breed. The distraught owner finds it mutilated and in horrific agony before a neighbour puts the dog out of its misery.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Kathleen Hewitt, a Nazi spy posing as an English girl who's friends with Jean Evans.
- Casanova Wannabe: Angelo, a short and stocky young man who models his image on Rudolph Valentino and flirts with all the girls he sees. His future self expresses disgust at the way he once was."What a shmuck! The boob don't realise what a geek he is. Do he really think he looks like Rudolph Valentino? He ain't as pretty as he likes to think. Look at him in that flying jacket - it's way too big. A pint-sized Romeo is all he is."
- Cheated Death, Died Anyway: The Webster sisters inform Angelo that he was meant to die in his thirteenth bombing mission, but because he honoured them with a ritual of pouring beer over his plane, they decided to spare him. However, that didn't stop him from being killed shortly afterward by military police who mistakenly believed he murdered his friend Frank.
- Cloudcuckoolander: Both the senile sisters Celandine and Veronica could qualify, but the former moreso as she is portrayed as especially goofy and in her own little world.
- Cloudcuckoolander's Minder: Ursula serves as this for both her sisters Celandine and Veronica, who have slipped into dementia and are prone to quirky behaviour.
- Creepy Child: Edie Dorkins, an 8-year-old girl who (in the first book) lives at a bombsite, wears an incendiary device around her neck, and "collects" the ghosts of bombing victims to be her family.
- Dating Catwoman: Protagonist Urdr/Ursula was at one point deeply in love with Woden and he with her, but eventually circumstances would result in him becoming the most deadly enemy of she and her sisters. Near the end of the trilogy, the two die together, having revealed that they still have feelings for one another in spite of all that has occurred.
- Defrosting Ice Queen: At first Jean is cold toward Angelo, not caring for his behaviour which she perceives as rude. But eventually she warms up to him and even comes to love him.
- Dying Declaration of Love: Just before both of their deaths, Woden tells Ursula that he truly loved her."Then at the final moment of Doom, know this," he said. "When we were together in the gardens beneath Yggdrasill, my heart was yours."
- Even Evil Has Standards: Even Woden is shocked that Ursula knew that he was going to kill her sisters and yet still allowed it to happen."In your hated web you entangled me, and your sisters you sent like cattle to be slaughtered. Was there ever a harder or a colder heart?"
- Future Self Reveal: The animated teddy bear who travels back in time to World War II with Neil is eventually revealed to be the ghost of Angelo Signorelli. He was an American GI who died then and wants to save his past self.
- Get Back to the Future: Neil's little brother Josh is tricked by Ted into entering a portal to the past, and the former is forced to jump in as well to save him. Initially all Neil wants to do is find Josh and get home. While that remains his ultimate goal, after he gets to know the people in the past Ted wants to save, he decides to help them also.
- Ghostapo: Nazi spy Kathleen Hewitt encounters Belial, an ancient demon from The Separate Collection that Neil and Ted unwittingly brought back into the past with them. She eagerly accepts his offer for her to become his new high priestess, certain that an alliance with the evil being would ensure a Nazi victory. But in the end he is defeated and her hopes are dashed.
- Good Luck Charm: The American GI Angelo Signorelli has a collection of these because he is terrified of dying on a mission.
- Happily Adopted: Edie Dorkins, who becomes the heir of the Webster sisters and is treated like a daughter by them.
- Help Yourself in the Future: After his death, Angelo Signorelli was given the opportunity by the Webster sisters to go back in time and save himself (as well as his friend, his love interest and her son). However, they made him wait for many years to do so, during which his soul was trapped inside a teddy bear in the Wyrd Museum. It was in this form that he returned to the past with Neil as his (initially) unwilling accomplice.
- Heel–Face Turn: One of Woden's two ravens, Memory, befriends Neil and is given the new name Quoth.
- I Did What I Had to Do: Ursula tries to justify letting Veronica and Celandine be killed as her way for them all to Face Death with Dignity.
- I Hate Past Me: As Ted, Angelo sees the events of his past as they play out upon traveling back in time. He regrets the cocky, womanizing attitude he used to have and dreads watching the mistakes he once made happen all over again.
- Innocently Insensitive: Kath appears this way initially, making blunt comments to Jean about the likelihood that her missing husband is dead, but the revelation of her secretly being a Nazi makes it clear she was fully aware of how hurtful she was being.
- I Was Quite a Looker: Miss Veronica was the most beautiful of the Nornir in her youth.
- Iron Lady: Miss Ursula, the stern caretaker of the Wyrd Museum and eldest of the Nornir.
- Jerkass: The absolutely vile Mrs. Stokes, who delights in bringing misery to everyone around her and has no sympathy for anyone, even dismissing her own grandson who died in the war as "stupid".
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Ted is mouthy and abrasive but comes to care for Neil. Jean finds Angelo to be rude initially and doesn't care for his attitude, but he then shows a more sensitive side that wins her over. It turns out that Ted is the ghost of Angelo, so the aforementioned examples refer to the same person.
- Kill the Cutie: Poor innocent Frank, murdered by a girl he loved who turned out to be a Nazi spy.
- Ladykiller in Love: The womanizing Angelo Signorelli finds himself falling deeply in love with Jean Evans.
- Late to the Realization: Despite the two having the same voice and other clues, it takes Neil a while to figure out that Angelo and Ted are one and the same. The latter even remarks with amusement that it took the boy long enough.
- Living Toys: Ted, who is a talking teddy bear. The reason for the toy's animation is that it is inhabited by the spirit of Angelo Signorelli, a World War II airman.
- Long-Lost Relative: Lauren's stepmother turns out to be Neil's estranged mother.
- Loss of Identity: The crow dolls used by Woden attach themselves to women who morph into the bloodthirsty Valkyries, having no memory of their previous selves. They all return to normal once free of the dolls, though.
- Lucky Rabbit's Foot: Jean asks Angelo if he has one of these, to which he responds "What luck did it ever bring the rabbit?"
- Meaningful Name: Webster, the modern surname adopted by the three Nornir who run the Wyrd Museum, is fitting as it means weaver. They weave the destinies of mortals.
- Missing Mom: Neil's mother left he and his little brother to be raised by their father. It turns out she is the stepmother of Lauren Humphries, a girl Neil befriends in the second book.
- Mistaken for Murderer: Angelo finds Frank stabbed to death and, while grieving over the body of his friend, is discovered by military police who think he was the murderer.
- The Mole: Kathleen Hewitt, who is really a Nazi spy taking on the identity of an English girl.
- My Future Self and Me: Played With in that Angelo finds and takes Ted to use as a good luck charm on his thirteenth bombing mission, but as the animated teddy bear does not move or speak in front of him never realises that it is inhabited by his own spirit from the future.
- Painful Transformation: The women to whom the crow dolls attach themselves are turned into horrific bird creatures, and are in total agony as it is happening. Their jaws split and become beaks, their arms snap and splinter into wings, and feathers erupt from their skin.
- Plucky Girl: Edie Dorkins. Her house was bombed during World War II and the rest of her family killed, but she wasn't fazed and became a tough and independent Wild Child.
- Really 700 Years Old: The Webster sisters, who look to be women in their 80s or 90s but are in fact far older, implied to be thousands upon thousands of years old. They are the three Nornir who have been controlling the fates of mortals since nearly the beginning of time.
- Royals Who Actually Do Something: The Webster sisters were princesses of the land of Askar, and were tasked with governing the fates of mortals. They've done this for centuries.
- Sealed Evil in a Can: Belial, an ancient evil kept by the Webster sisters in a casket in their Separate Collection. He accidentally is freed and must be recaptured by Neil and Ted.
- Set Right What Once Went Wrong: In the first book, Neil goes back in time to World War II London with a teddy bear haunted by the spirit of an American airman to save the latter's life and those he loves.
- Shoot the Dog: In the final book it is revealed that Ursula allowed her sisters to be killed by Woden as she knew the end was near for them all and wanted it orchestrated the way she planned.
- Some Call Me "Tim": As time went on, the Nornir began calling themselves Ursula, Veronica, and Celandine, which are modern equivalents of their original names: Urdr, Verdandi, and Skuld.
- Sour Outside, Sad Inside: Ursula Webster is outwardly nasty, but inwardly it has pained her that others think of her as cold (especially her beloved Woden) when she is doing what has to be done for the good of all.
- Star-Crossed Lovers:
- Angelo and Jean. Their relationship is doomed from the start as Jean is married (though her husband is missing in action and presumed dead by most). Then circumstances arise which lead to the death of Angelo and, prior to Ted and Neil going back in time to save her, Jean. In the final book Neil meets with the elderly Jean in the present day and she tells him her husband did eventually return.
- Woden and Urdr/Ursula. Any chance for happiness they had was destroyed when the former chose to attain godhood by being nailed to Yggdrasill.
- Transformation Horror: When the crow dolls attach themselves to unsuspecting women and turn them into bird monsters, the transformations are described in terrifying detail.
- Valkyries: These appear in The Raven's Knot as the servants of Woden.
- Was Once a Man: The Valkyries were human women who became horrific bird creatures under the power of Woden's crow dolls.
- The Weird Sisters: The Webster sisters, who are literally the Fates (or Nornir). The name of the Wyrd Museum is quite possibly a reference to this trope.
- Wild Child: Edie, at least early on, as at the bombsite she speaks very little and has a tendency to behave in an animalistic fashion.
- World Tree: The last remaining root of Yggdrasill exists beneath the Wyrd Museum.
- You Can't Fight Fate: While Ted and Neil are able to save Jean and her son by traveling back in time, the deaths of Angelo and Frank play out just as they did before. Ted (an alias for the spirit of Angelo trapped in a teddy bear) angrily asks the Webster sisters why they let it happen this way again, and Ursula responds that they never intended for anything to change in the first place, thus having tricked him."The path we all follow is already woven for us."
