Showing 225–240 of 1000 resultsSorted by popularity
“Phantoms” (1885) is a classic study of a haunting, in which the narrator refuses to admit that the apparitions from which he suffers can be anything but hallucinations, but then ties himself in knots trying to explain them in terms of his own psychology, which he claims unconvincingly to be free from guilt. The story…
The Brothers of Death (1856) is the second volume in a series of four that tells the story of the Hulet family which, for generations, has headed the government’s spy network, the Secret Bureau, that intercepts and opens all private mail. From the execution of Charles I of England to the secret terror spread by…
The Police Agent (1867) is a milestone in the development of crime fiction. Its eponymous hero, the cunning Mr. Porion, a.k.a. Père Cinnamon, does not employ his detective skills to pursue a vampire-like serial killer intent on bleeding children, but rather to protect him, while simultaneously serving other predatory aristocratic interests, such as providing the…
1940: The Frankenstein Monster’s quest for a mate takes a startling new turn. Deep in the jungles of South America, he discovers a descendent of the infamous Victor Frankenstein: Elizabeth, whose mad genius may be equal to his creator. With the Monster’s evil assistance, she agrees to build him an undead mate. As this monstrous…
The Gates of Hell is a collection of twenty-six stories originally published in 1910. These tales, in the tradition of the contes cruels, range from a man who keeps a secret with devastating effects to a maniac who finds thrills in witnessing violent accidents, to a blind man who purposely loses his eyesight, to a…
Nicolas-Edmé Restif de la Bretonne (1734-1806) produced over 180 books, totaling some 57,000 pages, many of them printed by his own hand, on almost every conceivable subject. Praised in Germany, he was mostly forgotten in France until being rediscovered by the Surrealists in the early 20th century. Several of his most important works are being…
Nicolas-Edmé Restif de la Bretonne (1734-1806) produced over 180 books, totaling some 57,000 pages, many of them printed by his own hand, on almost every conceivable subject. Praised in Germany, he was mostly forgotten in France until being rediscovered by the Surrealists in the early 20th century. Several of his most important works are being…
The Man Who Married a Mermaid (1949) tells the picaresque story of a sailor, Père Olifus, who first marries a mermaid, then embarks upon a series of voyages to a semi-mythical Far East where he enjoys various economic opportunities, but remains plagued by the vengeful astral form of the mermaid wife he left behind. Master…
The Angel Asrael (1832) is the most revealing and the purest of S. Henry Berthoud’s fantasies, and a significant early contribution to what became the great Romantic and Symbolist tradition of “literary satanism,” in which writers deliberately adopted a stance removed from orthodox Christianity in order to reappraise the character of Satan. As might be…
Fortuné Du Boisgobey (1821-1891) was the chief of the followers of Émile Gaboriau, creator of Monsieur Lecoq. He was a prolific writer, with more than sixty works to his name, and one of the most popular French feuilleton writers. His novels dealt with crime, the police, and Parisian life. They had a high circulation, and…
The Human Paradise (1930) is a scathingly sarcastic satire in which God offers to grant wishes expressed unanimously by the entirety of humankind. The wishes voiced are carefully extrapolated in such a way as to suggest that, however effective individuals might be at screwing up their wishes, a committee composed of the whole human race…
The End of Atlantis (1926) extends a rich tradition of French literary fantasies redeploying the myth of Atlantis; it is a historical melodrama, an adventure story and a heroic fantasy depicting the fall of the great and marvelous Empire of Atlantis. The novel is more sophisticated than most Atlantean fantasies. Its account of the fall…
From the deadly streets of St. Petersburg to the Palaces of India, from the back alleys of Paris to the deck of the Titanic, this prodigious saga tells the story of the death of Fantômas, and of his arch-nemesis, Detective Juve. Defying the Tsar’s secret police, Russian anarchists, Thuggee from India and Parasian Apaches, Juve,…
Pierre Yrondy, the author of The Adventures of Thérèse Arnaud of the French Secret Service, penned those of Marius Pégomas, Marseille Detective, serialized in 35 installments published in 1936. Six of these are being translated here for the first time. Marius Pégomas is one of the first “regional detectives” and, physically, bears some resemblance to…
The Beauty and the Beast by Madame Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve was first published in 1740 and later abridged and rewritten by Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont in a better-known version in 1743.The main interests of Mme de Villeneuve’s story are two sections, one in which the Beast explains how he came to be transformed and…
Arrival in the Stars is a product of the aftermath of the Great War, and it deals directly with one of the widespread psychological effects of the war: a resurgence of interest in spiritualism. It is an extended conte philosophique seriously addressing the question of life after death as it was conceived at the time…
