To the Devil — a Diva! (novel)

To the Devil — a Diva!
Main character(s):	Lance Randall, Fox Soames
Featuring:	Cleavis
Main enemy:	Karla Sorenson
Main setting:	Manchester, Britain, 1940s and 2000s
Key crew
Publisher:	Allison & Busby
Writer:	Paul Magrs
Release details
Release date:	September 2004
Format:	Paperback book, 288 pages
ISBN:	ISBN 0-74908-380-8

To the Devil — a Diva! was a novel by Paul Magrs which featured characters and concepts which had previously appeared in the BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures novel Mad Dogs and Englishmen and the Short Trips story Kept Safe and Sound.

Publisher's summary

Karla Sorenson used to be big in horror films. In the 60s and 70s no self-respecting low-budget bloody schlocker shocker waas complete without the Queen of Vampires presiding all over it. She was well qualified for it, after all... at the age of ten, she sold her sold to the devil.

Now, although spookily ageless, Karla is knocking on in years. Her residuals are drying up and she needs some cash, so she decides to return to the north of England, to Manchester, to appear in Menswear, Britain's most risque TV soap opera.

But not everyone's happy about her return to the fame game. Menswear's current star is Lance Randall, the famously sexually-confused heart-throb, and he's furious to hear that Karla is about to become his co-star. He hates her, he fears her, and he's convinced that she's come to steal his very soul. Dark clouds are massing around Manchester - and a deep, dark, devilish secrets are about to be unleashed...

Plot

to be added

Characters

• Sally
• Katy MacBride
• Sally's Mam
• Samantha
• Ginger girl
• Mrs Beech
• Michael Figgis
• Isla Figgis
• Fox Soames
• Magda Soames
• Lance Randall
• Dennis
• Karla Sorenson
• Brenda
• Brenda's husband
• Lance Randall's agent
• Adrian
• Adrian's secretary
• Colin
• Cleavis
• Raf
• Raf's assistant

Referenced only

• Mrs MacBride
• Butcher's wife
• Butcher
• Flissy
• Sammi Randall
• Colin's gran
• Buffy fan

Worldbuilding

• In SpoilerSpace, Raf tells his assistant that if any Doctor Who fans are to come in for the latest book, they'll have to wait due to a late delivery.
  • The assistant thinks that Doctor Who fans are the worst, but Raf believes that there are other fans even worse.
• Colin once had sex with fan of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The fan had a scraggy mohican.

Notes

• Professor Cleavis's first name is not stated in this novel.
• The title is an homage to the Dennis Wheatley novel To the Devil, a Daughter. Another Wheatley novel title was parodied by Iris Rides Out.
• Philip Purser-Hallard's use of Cleavis in the Time Hunter novel Peculiar Lives was informed by the character's appearance in To The Devil — A Diva.

Continuity

• Fox Soames was a British horror writer active in the 1940s. (PROSE: Mad Dogs and Englishmen, Kept Safe and Sound)
• Magda Soames is married with Fox. (PROSE: From Wildthyme with Love)
• Karla Sorenson and Lance Randall star in Menswear in the 2000s. (PROSE: Wildthyme Beyond!)
• Fox Soames was a member of the Smudgelings, and a friend of Reginald Tyler. (PROSE: Mad Dogs and Englishmen)
• Cleavis is a member of the Smudgelings who goes on adventures. (PROSE: Mad Dogs and Englishmen, Fellowship of Ink, Iris Wildthyme and the Polythene Terror)