The Curse of the Blue Figurine is the second of the Johnny Dixon adventures, which began with The Mummy, the Will, and the Crypt. These two novels, published in 1983, introduce Johnny Dixon as Bellairs's main character, Professor Childermass as his friend and elderly patron, and Duston Heights as the main location for the action. In The Spell of the Sorcerer's Skull (1984) and The Revenge of the Wizard's Ghost (1985) Johnny and the professor continue to save each other from evil supernatural forces.

In other novels, Bellairs introduces other young heroes, such as Anthony Monday, who appears in The Treasure of Alpheus Winterborn (1976), a novel set in Minnesota, and reappears in The Dark Secret of Weatherend (1984). But whether the novels are set in New Zebedee, Michigan, in Duston Heights, Massachusetts, or in Hoosac, Minnesota, and whether the characters are named Lewis Barnavelt, Johnny Dixon, or Anthony Monday, all...