Dracula Cha Cha Cha (re-titled Judgment of Tears in the US), is a 1998 novel by British writer Kim Newman. It is the third book in the Anno Dracula series.
In 1959, several of the world's notable vampires gather in Rome for the wedding of Count Dracula. Nefarious schemes are afoot and being investigated by British Intelligence, the Diogenes Club, and several others, including a British spy on the trail of a sinister madman with a white cat.
The book is an alternate history novel set in a world where Van Helsing never killed Dracula. The version of Rome shown in the book is heavily influenced by Italian filmmaker Federico Fellini. As always in the series, the novel contains a number of characters from other fictional works, though due to copyright restrictions some are not named or are given aliases.
Some of these identity shifts are quite clear (such as the character of Commander Hamish Bond, who has a fondness for martinis, drives an Aston Martin, carries a Walther PPK, has the Scots version of the name "James" for his name, and gets to say "the bitch is dead."), while some are more obscure (a Kansas football player named Kent, for example).
The novel's original title is inspired by Bruno Martino's song Dracula Cha Cha Cha, which appears on the album Italian Graffiti (1960/61?) and is performed onscreen in Vincente Minnelli's film Two Weeks in Another Town (1962).
These characters come from a variety of different sources. Some, mostly those from public domain works, are listed by name. Some of the others are listed by mere descriptions.
Mr and Mrs Addams — From The Addams Family
Professor Adelsberg — From the film Der Fluch der grünen Augen
Armand — From Anne Rice's The Vampire Chronicles
Mr. Big — From the novel Live and Let Die by Ian Fleming
Miriam Blaylock — From the novel The Hunger by Whitley Strieber
Peter Blood — From the film Doctor Blood's Coffin
Commander Hamish Bond — James Bond from the works of Ian Fleming.
Gregor Brastov — From the novel The Soft Whisper of the Dead by Charles L. Grant
Cabiria — From the film Le Notti di Cabiria
Zé do Caixão (Coffin Joe) — From the films by José Mojica Marins
Madame Cassandra — From the film Beverly Hills Vamp
Bianca Castafiore — From The Adventures of Tintin comics by Hergé
Lemmy Caution — From the film Alphaville
Marguerite Chopin of Courtempierre — From the film Vampyr
Inspector Clouseau — From the film The Pink Panther
Barnabas Collins — From the television series Dark Shadows
Jonas Cord — From the novel The Carpetbaggers by Harold Robbins
Edmund Cordery — From the novel The Empire of Fear by Brian Stableford
Michael Corleone — From The Godfather films and novels
Honoria Cornelius — From the Jerry Cornelius novels by Michael Moorcock
The Crimson Executioner — From the film Bloody Pit of Horror
Toby Dammit — From the film Spirits of the Dead
Waldemar Daninsky — From the films of Paul Naschy
Vivian Darkbloom and Clare Quilty — From the novel Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
Count Karol de Lavud — From the film El Vampiro
Don Sebastian de Villanueva — From the novels of Les Daniels
Norma Desmond - from the film Sunset Boulevard
Dondi — From the comic-strip of the same name
Count Dracula — From the novel Dracula by Bram Stoker
Sergeant Dravot — From the novel The Man Who Would Be King by Rudyard Kipling
Elisabeta of Transylvania — From the film Bram Stoker's Dracula
Erik - From the novel The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux
Webb Fallon — From the film The Vampire's Ghost
Fantômas — From the works of Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre
Hugh Farnham — From the novel Bad Dreams by Kim Newman
Faethor Ferenczy — From the Necroscope novels by Brian Lumley
Frankenstein's monster — From the film versions played by Boris Karloff
Doctor Fu Manchu — From the novels by Sax Rohmer
Sergeant Ginko — Later Inspector Ginko from the Italian comic Diabolik
Doctor Génessier — From the film Eyes Without a Face
Lord Greystoke — From the Tarzan series by Edgar Rice Burroughs
Casper Gutman (a.k.a. 'The Fat Man') —...from the book and films The Maltese Falcon is likely the mentioned 'enormous[...]collector and dealer in rare and unprovenanced artifacts' who might be called-upon to fence some stolen items, which set in fact includes what is likely the Falcon, as well as likely the Seven Stars and the Monkey's Paw.
Anthony Hancock — From the Tony Hancock film The Rebel
Dr. Hichcock — From the film The Horrible Dr. Hichcock
General Iorga — From the films Count Yorga, Vampire and The Return of Count Yorga
The Jewish golem — From the film The Golem: How He Came into the World
Kent, the football player — Clark Kent, from the Superman comics published by DC Comics
Count Kernassy — From the film L'Ultima Preda del Vampiro
Rosa Klebb — From the novel From Russia with Love by Ian Fleming
Klove — From the films Dracula: Prince of Darkness and Scars of Dracula
Jeddidiah Leland — From the film Citizen Kane
Doctor Mabuse — From the works of Norbert Jacques
Malenka — From the film La Nipote del Vampiro
Marcello — From the film La Dolce Vita
Baron Meinster — From the film The Brides of Dracula
Father Lankester Merrin — From the novel The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty
Count Mitterhouse — From the film Vampire Circus
Luna Mora — From the film Mark of the Vampire
Professor Moriarty — From the works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Dr. Julius No — From the novel Dr. No by Ian Fleming
Count Oblensky — From the film The Horrible Sexy Vampire
Olympia — From the short story The Sandman by E. T. A. Hoffmann
Dr. Orlof — From the film The Awful Dr. Orlof
Doctor Septimus Pretorius — From the film Bride of Frankenstein
Colonel Pyat — From the Pyat Quartet by Michael Moorcock
Hamer Radshaw — From the film Fame Is the Spur
Kate Reed — A character from Dracula who was cut from the final novel
Richmond Reed — From the film Vampire Hookers
Tom Ripley — From the "Ripley" novels by Patricia Highsmith
Drago Robles — From the film Curse of the Undead
Lord Ruthven — From the short story The Vampyre by Dr. John William Polidori
Tintin — From The Adventures of Tintin comics by Hergé
Lady Anibas Vadja — From the film La Maschera del Demonio
Princess Asa Vadja — From the film La Maschera del Demonio
Irma Vep — From the film Les Vampires
Radu Vladislas — From the film Subspecies and its sequels
Anton Voytek — From the 1979 TV series Vampire
Herbert West - From the short story Herbert West–Reanimator by H. P. Lovecraft
Edward Weyland — From the novel The Vampire Tapestry by Suzy McKee Charnas
Joshua York — From the novel Fevre Dream by George R. R. Martin
Don Simon Ysidro — From the "James Asher, Vampire" novels by Barbara Hambley
Anthony Zenith — From the Sexton Blake series
Mater Lachrymarum — From Thomas De Quincey's prose poem Levana and our Ladies of Sorrow, as well as Dario Argento's The Three Mothers trilogy.
Both The Incredible Hulk and Iron Fist of Marvel Comics are alluded to in the final chapters of the book (specifically the short story Aquarius published in the new Titan Books edition of the story), as Kate Reed is mentioned as having read about Gamma Bomb testing (though the location was changed to taking place in India, as opposed to the Nevada desert) and later ruminating about mythical lost cities, including K'un L'un, the mystical village in the Himalayas where Iron Fist received his training.
Anthony Armstrong-Jones
Elizabeth Báthory
Simone de Beauvoir
Lavrenti Beria (Note that it is implied that he is alive in the novel's 1959;in our world, he was killed in 1953.)
Junio Valerio Borghese
Asa Briggs
Alessandro Cagliostro
Nicolae Ceauşescu
R. Chetwynd-Hayes
Winston Churchill
Alan Clark
Mark W. Clark
Salvador Dalí
Charles de Gaulle
Gilles de Rais
Kirk Douglas
Amintore Fanfani
Daniel Farson
Mel Ferrer
Errol Flynn
Sari Gábor
Andrey Gromyko
Rita Hayworth
Ernest Hemingway
Audrey Hepburn
Valerie Hobson (under her married name Valerie Profumo)
John Huston
John F. Kennedy
Ludovic Kennedy
The Aga Khan
Nikita Khrushchev
Fritz Lang
Dino De Laurentiis
Gina Lollobrigida
Sophia Loren
Clare Boothe Luce
Bishop Albino Luciani (the future Pope John Paul I)
Magda Lupescu
Princess Margaret
Dean Martin
Enrico Mattei
Yves Montand
Alberto Moravia
John Osborne
Pier Paolo Pasolini
Edgar Allan Poe
Carlo Ponti
Enoch Powell
John Profumo
Elvis Presley
Edmund Purdom
Gilles de Rais
Count of St. Germain
Jean-Paul Sartre
Moira Shearer
Frank Sinatra
Simone Signoret
Lytton Strachey
Montague Summers
Ilona Szilagy
Palmiro Togliatti
Totò
Gore Vidal
Orson Welles
Dennis Wheatley
Colin Wilson
