It’s been almost a year since Jonathan Harker made that fateful first trip to Transylvania. The monster that imprisoned him, that threatened his love, that died in a box of earth by two blades, has been gone for months. Yet Jonathan’s nightmares have never left. In fact, as the bleak anniversary nears, they have worsened. Van Helsing’s mesmerism has made no progress in freeing him from the nightly horror. But he has come from Amsterdam for a potentially fruitful visit to another professor.
Prof. Wilson is playing host to a mesmerist of singular and uncanny power, Miss Helen Penclosa. On meeting the troubled young man and his wife, she is only too happy to help…
So opens Penclosa, a story sadly locked in stasis for the indefinite time being. The work is a crossover between Bram Stoker’s novel, Dracula and Arthur Conan Doyle’s short story, “The Parasite.” The one features the infamous vampire and the heroes who clash with him, the other stars a professor who gets himself entangled in the amorous-to-villainous intentions of a hypnotist who’s implied to have more than the usual power behind her mesmeric ability. While I was reading both of these stories around the same time, an idea occurred:
Wow. This hypno-lady would be such a huge problem for Jonathan Harker specifically.
Which led to the next thought:
I should make her a huge problem for Jonathan Harker specifically.
And then I did!
(Sorry there’s no grander scheme behind it than that, I just like playing dolls with scary classic lit characters. And terrorizing my favorite gothic horror solicitor in particular. Sorry, Mr. Harker.)
That said, I make no promises as to an if or when of continuing Penclosa beyond the point it was paused at. I have an inkling of other ways to play with the story in a further-down-the-line plot where she meets the Harkers under different circumstances, but I’m also really attached to the bones I’ve already laid down here. So it’s a bit up in the air for now. Let me know what you guys think, I’d love to know what the interest level is.
In the meantime, don’t make direct eye contact with any mesmerists and/or undead horrors.
To start reading, go here: