| Abigale and Redford Wahl | Abby, age 13, is an avid reader and resourceful girl all-around, who lives with her brother, Reddi (age 11), and parents in a house bordering the edges of Halfrock Swamp. She's the main protagonist in The Heckbender. "Missing" notices for both Abby and Reddi show up on a corkboard at the Brockleport General Store at the end of NSNR. |
| Jonathon York | A mild-mannered sop, to the point of spinelessness, who lives his life in order to be overlooked by everyone. He attended Brockleport Community College, and works as a clerk in the Brockleport General Store for the manager Mr. Jonesmith. His adventures are chronicled in NSNR. |
| Virginia Lanky Man "Odd" Man |
Virginia starts out as a happy-go-lucky little girl with golden curls, only to discover the secret of Slynderfell's ice cream (they're made with animal parts and halite). This causes her to go mad, and to start covering her face with a hooded cloak. She's currently in her 20's or so. The Lanky and "Odd" men accompany Virginia around the country. Lanky is a tall, thin, dark-skinned guy with dreadlocks. He swam to the depths of the sea to recover a green emerald engagement ring his fiance dropped, only to find himself standing in the Returns line in the jewelry store because she doesn't like the color. The "odd" man was abducted by aliens, his brain removed and his eyebrows extracted. (His eyebrows are later used in a goblet of zombie juice.) The trio feature heavily in NSNR, and resurface briefly in D3. |
| Mortimer and Mrs. Cankerbury | (Name is unconfirmed. What's known is that Mortimer and wife run the Cankerbury Inn). Mortimer is a cranky old man that lives in the middle of Halfrock Swamp with his wife, first name unknown. They have everything they want already, so rather than charging money for staying at their inn, they require that all potential renters tell them some kind of a story. Pictures in the inn include the group photo of the League of Astonishing Vermin, and the clown from Steven King's "It", and the pictures also age with time. [NSNR] |
| Derring-Do Dan | Dan is a teller of tall tales, first encountered in Rosie Thornsuckle's Mudpup Inn and Tavern boring the regulars. While there's a good chance that none of his stories are based in fact, there are hints that maybe not all of the details are purely make-believe. A rough version of him appears in The Heckbender, and he stars in D3. He bought his boat, the Sand Flea, from Cap'n Eddie (the character from Wiley Miller's Non Sequitur), and Eddie himself appears with Polly later at the end of the Selkie sub-story. Dan claims to have married a selkie, who has returned to the sea, and learned the secret word of the weasels. He's last seen leaving the mudpup in the company of Scheri the rat in search of new adventures. |
| King, Queen and Princess of Wonderdum | The King and Queen are so concerned about the legacy they're going to leave behind that they mismanage the country and run it into the ground. Along the way, their daughter goes into a funk and they invite jesters to try to make her laugh (failure equals death by decapitation). Derring-Do Dan manages to not only entertain the girl, but to also fulfill all of the other impossible tasks they set him to. In the end, Dan causes the peasants to rise up against them and they get exiled. The King and Queen go to Skreepit Gulch, while the Princess runs off with Kommander Kroakula and has adventures under the name Dastardly Diana. They're all featured in D3, while Diana's and Kroakula's initials show up on a tree in The Bogey. |
| The Heckbender | The Heckbender is the scariest of the monsters living in Halfrock Swamp, at least in terms of the tales Mr. and Mrs. Wahl tell their children in order to keep them in line. It's a cave dweller that loves eating humans just before hibernating for the winter. It keeps piles of books and other items as souvenirs, but is unable to read by itself. In a way, the Heckbender is more sensitive and understanding of the stories contained within books, than are the humans chasing it. The Heckbender only appears in the story of the same name, and is presumed to currently be living in a different part of the swamp. |
| Leeshkin Slynderfell | A large cockroach kind of a guy with red and green eyes. His ancestors came to Earth a long time ago, so technically he's an Earthling. He runs The Slynderfell Cavalcade of Gustatory Glory factory, which uses bits and parts of dogs, cats and rats for collagen as a custard-substitute. His ice cream names are a parody of Ben and Jerry's, and empty cartons show up scattered throughout several of the later stories. Expired product gets dumped in Halfrock Swamp. Some of his staff include Verminosh (a fanged caterpillar that impersonates an old tomcat), Kreelit (a smaller version of himself that works as his personal assistant), Kleguela (a flower-headed lizard researcher) and Gillikiti (as yet unpictured). Leeshkin is married to Oggalulu. When talking to visitors, he speaks in Willy Wonka-style rhymes. He wears a necklace made of Keebler elf teeth. Slynderfell appears in Virginia's portion of NSNR, and chapter 17 of The Bogey. |
| C. Percival Trullus | A dimunitive troll that lives under a bridge, and spends much of his time in Halfrock Swamp, though he pretty much goes whereever he smells money. He created the "Pissing Calvin" design and trades in bootleg goods as well as stolen Academy awards and movie scripts. He has a cameo in LAV and D3, his name appears in the jail in the selkie story in D3 (for a gud time call 867-5309 (number for the Tommy Tutone song "Jenny"). He's featured in NSNR and shows up a number of times in The Bogey. A note that he's written appears in one scene in LAV. |
| Phintesmo Blyme and the West Bleekport Gang | The West Bleekport Gang inhabits a wide swath of the Halfrock Swamp, although they do get out to Sineligo Sea in the D3 story. They're headed by the murderous Phintesmo Blyme, a creature whose face is 100% dagger-tooth-filled smile. Other members include Shmeevil (gar face), Sleurth (eel-neck), Skabcraw (8-legger) and Grulmet (helmet head). In NSNR, they're physically defeated by Jonathan York, and in D3 they're outwitted by Derring-Do Dan. |
| Big Tom Thunderclump and Wife | Big Tom is a human-eating giant that lives near the Muttergor mountains along with his wife. Tom had stolen three zealoraptor eggs that Derring-Do Dan wants to return to their parents. Tom has a short temper, but his weakness is that he wants to be viewed as "a proper gentleman". Dan tricks him out of the eggs, and in doing so causes the deaths of a pig, the wife's cat, and possibly Mrs. Tom herself (she's last seen stuffed into a boiling kettle). [D3] |
| Kommander Kroakula | A boastful, weakling gob-hoblin that is hired by the King of Wonderdum to pretend to kidnap the Princess and then kill Derring-Do Dan. Dan rips his arm off during an arm wrestling contest. Kroakula is later seen with a hook on his right stump, running around with "Dastardly Diana" (see above). [D3], [TB] |
| Sym-Iy-Kro | Sym-Iy-Kro is a spindly insect-like necromancer living in the swamps. He has a green brew that he uses to turn people into zombie slaves. He's defeated by Jonathan York, but we later see that the "Odd" man's eye brows are tossed into the goblet. |
| Vix Reynard | A British fox that can trace its ancestry back to the old trickster folktales. [LAV] |
| N. (Nicodemus) | A weathered rat that leads the League of Astonishing Vermin. He was the product of NIMH research, and due to copyright issues, can only be called by his first initial. He replaced Charlotte as group leader after she was killed in the field. [LAV] |
| Agent Little | A small white mouse. Can not use his full name also because of copyright (AKA: Stewart). [LAV] |
| Agent Cottontail | A stuffy, snobby rabbit. Can not use his full name also because of copyright (AKA: Peter). [LAV] |
| Agent Anansi | Anansi is a spider trickster popular in African and Caribbean folklore. He acts as a double agent on behalf of N. and the League. [LAV] |
| Kotick the White Seal Rikki-Tikki-Tavi Agent Toad |
The rest of the League Members. Kotick and Riki come from Kipling's The Jungle Book, while Toad is from Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. [LAV] |
| The Leader | AKA: Napolean. The Leader is the main antagonist from Orwell's Animal Farm. He's an ugly, power-mad hog attempting to create a race of super-rats for taking over the world. According to his description, he was a cross between the experiments from the NIMH lab, and the work of Dr. Moreau. [LAV] |
| J. Baskerville II Bruce |
These are three of Napolean's minions. J. is another of the NIMH rats. Baskerville II is a descendent of Arthur Conan Doyle's Hound of the Baskervilles, while Bruce is a mutant killer shark from Margaret Wise Brown's Goodnight Moon. [LAV] |
| Scheri | A raggedy, cowardly female rat that inhabits Rosie Thornsuckle's Mudpup Inn and Tavern. She eventually convinces Derring-Do Dan to not kill her, and the two of them are last seen heading into the sunset on a new adventure. [D3] |