<p>Jane de La Vaud&egrave;re was one of the most unusual writers of the <em>fin de si&egrave;cle</em>, renowned both for her scandalously scabrous Parisian novels, and her accounts of <em>moeurs antiques</em>, some of which&mdash;notably <em>Le Myst&egrave;re de Kama</em> (1901)&mdash;set new standards of excess.</p><p>Presented here is her first volume of short stories to be available in English, superbly translated by Brian Stableford: nine extravagant tales of hypnotism and magic, reincarnation and vengeance, animal tamers and necrophilia. &nbsp;Sublimely Gothic, exquisitely hallucinatory, these strange, fatalistic pieces by La Vaud&egrave;re are surely a landmark in the annals of the fantastic.</p>