Little Known or Unused Public Domain Pulp Heroines
Thought that I’d compile a list of some neat female characters from public domain works that could be neat in new stories.
Rhoda Prentiss - The Shadow in the Attic by August Derleth
First up, the actual heroine of Derleth’s story of a man inheriting a spooky house from his old magic-using relative. Rhoda, the protag’s fiance, realises that something is afoot when they find evidence of a mysterious woman roaming the house in the dead of night, and after doing some research into the mysterious uncle and his “hobby“ works out that there are supernatural schenangians afoot.
However, the undead magician’s scheme to possess the body of his young relative is foiled by Rhoda, who elects to just burn the house down from outside to disrupt any spells the guy had in place. Luckily, she also has the wherewithall to put a ladder against a window for her fiance to escape, which he does.
The pair eventually get married, but there’s an implication that part of the wizard’s mind may still lurk in her husband’s brain.
Rhoda could be good for a paranormal researcher/occult detective kinda deal maybe?
Rose Dexter - The Dark Brotherhood by August Derleth
One of Derleth’s more stupid outings, the Dark Brotherhood involves a 1920s proto-goth by the name of Arthur Phillips going on long night walks, where he is accompanied by one Rose Dexter.
On one of their nightly rambles, Arthur and Rose bump into a guy who looks mysteriously like Edgar Allan Poe… who leads them to a house inhabitted by multiple (I think that there are like seven?) duplicates of the author. Turns out that aliens have come to Earth (implictly from the future or the past, I can’t remember which) and decided to use a state of Poe as their basis for a human disguise… The story is very silly (so many Poes!).
Least ways, the finale involves Arthur saving Rose from being duplicated by the Deadly Poes, with the implication that he might have saved the wrong one. In any case, the epilogue of the story states that he went mad and attacked Rose, who them killed him in self defence. Whether this was the real Rose or duplicate Rose is left up for debate.
Kate Reed - Dracula (unused, existed in the earlier drafts) by Bram Stoker
One of several characters that didn’t make it into the final book (which includeed a paranormal researcher and a detective) Kate was a reporter who I believe was intended to be a friend of Mina and/or Lucy.
Most recently Kate has been used as a character in his alternate universe Anno Dracula franchise (based in a world where Dracula won and married Queen Victoria, establishing a vampiric aristrocracy in Victorian Britain), but as she remains in Stoker’s original notes I believe she’s still covered by fair use.
Could be interesting for writers wishing to approach the events of the original story from a different angle, such as having Kate be a London-based reporter who is covering those stories of the vampirised Lucy attacking Cockney children, for example.
Likewise, the wife of Abraham van Helsing is a character refered to in the original story, but does not make an actual appearance “on panel“ as it were. From what van Helsing states in the story, she evidently had a breakdown of some sort after the death of their son, leading to him locking her in a mental institution. The circumstances of this aren’t elaborated on further, although a prequel story explaining how van Helsing Jr. died (was it more vampiry stuff?) could be interesting.
Enid Challenger - the Professor Challenger novels by Arthur Conan Doyle
Yes, turns out that Doyle’s the Lost World was actually one of several science fiction stories that he wrote, at least partly due to annoyance with the Holmes stories.
Aside from Challenger’s wife, Jessica, their daughter Enid later becomes a character in the stories, most notably in 1926′s the Land of Mist, wherein she is a now a reporter alongside the Professor’s Lost World companion Edward Malone.
The Land of Mist was basically ACD’s attempt at publicising his new interest in spiritualism, and involves Enid learning that she has psychic powers and becomes a medium, while Edward uses his new occult knowledge to stop some hauntings.
I don’t know, Enid teaming up with an older Kate Reed could be an interesting story concept, in addition to her being roughly a contemporary of Derleth’s Lovecraft-influenced characters.
Lucy Hebron/Monro - the Adventure of the Yellow Face by Arthur Conan Doyle
A rare mixed race character for Victorian fiction (white American mother, African American lawyer father), Lucy was secretly smuggled back to England by her mum following the death of her father from yellow fever. Lucy’s mum, Effie, eventually remarried, but worried that her new husband, Grant Monro, would be a huge racist (itself not an unreasonable worry in the 1890s), hid her away in a house aways from the new family home.
However, Grant was confused as to why his new wife was borrowing large sums of money from his and sneaking off to a cottage in then rural South London, where he saw someone wearing a yellow-mask wandering around inside. Concerned that Effie might be having an affair, Grant goes to Sherlock Holmes, who promptly leaps to the conclusion that she IS either having an affair or is being blackmailed by her supposedly “dead“ American husband.
Eventually Lucy’s mum explains what the heck is going on, and, to the surprise of everyone, Grant picks Lucy up as he apologises for giving the impression that he’d reject his new daughter, and the three walk off happily. The story concludes with Holmes telling Watson to remind him of this case in the future, so that he doesn’t automatically leap to the most cynical conclusion without evidence first.
I believe that someone has actually written a story from the perspective of an older Lucy (pretty much EVERY character in the Holmes canon has had a story written from their POV at some point), but she remains a unique character to explore within this setting.
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