Book News ~ Out of the Ages by Devereux Pryce

I am very pleased to announce that the first Nezu Press title of 2025 will be Out of the Ages by Devereux Pryce, an extremely rare novel that hasn't been republished since it first appeared in 1923. Devereux Pryce was the nom de plume of Sir Gerard Albert Muntz, and Out of the Ages was his only published work of fiction.

I know, it's unusual for Nezu Press to publish a chap. But the first book of last year was by a fellow, and I think we may make January the month of exceptions.

So, shall I tell you what it's about then? Well, I did write a blog post about it a while back, so you can read my review by clicking here. And here's the blurb:

Thira Colquhoun is a rich, beautiful, married woman who is very used to having her way; Jack Winthrop is the man she wants to have her way with, and Janet Baxter is the woman unfortunate enough to stand in her way. When Jack takes a job in Purnam, on the other side of the world, Thira is determined to follow him. So she and her unsuspecting husband, along with a group of friends, embark on a long voyage east, heading across the Mediterranean to Egypt, then sailing down the Red Sea and along the African coast to Purnam. While cruising along the Nile, the Colquhouns encounter a French archaeologist who invites them to visit a recently excavated tomb. It contains the remains of King Amenhotep’s favourite, a priestess who was suffocated to death by a group of priests. And one of the Colquhoun party does exactly what you should never do when you visit the final resting place of a murdered Egyptian… she removes an ancient cylinder from the tomb as a keepsake… with inevitably disastrous results. 

This new edition includes a biographical essay by me: ‘Gerard Albert Muntz: The Renowned Metallurgist Who Had Never Been to Egypt’

Published: 25 January 2025.
ISBN: 978-1-917113-06-9.
Hardback with dust jacket, 22.86mm x 15.24cm (6" x 9"), 284 pages.

I have a thing for Egypt; I have had ever since I visited the Egyptian department of Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery (I must have been about nine years old at the time). I was fascinated by the museum's model of Abu Simbel and one of their sarcophagi (there was a little corner missing at the foot, and I was always trying to see inside). Anyway, I've gone off at a tangent there.  If you think the image on the cover seems familiar, that's because it probably is; it's by David Roberts.

The book is available to pre-order from the Nezu Press store (please click here). Alternatively, it will be available from the usual online retailers, and you can order it from bricks-and-mortar stores. It is already at Amazon UK (please click here) and US (please click here).

Vanity's Price ~ E. Yolland

I am pleased to announce that the final Nezu Press title of 2024 will be Vanity's Price by E. Yolland. This new edition of the novel—its first republication since it first appeared in 1900—includes the essay ‘In Search of E. Yolland’ (by me), which originally appeared in Mistress Bridget (Nezu Press, 2023).

So, what's it all about... Alfie?

According to family legend, in every generation of the Ainslie family one child is born heartless, ‘in sad and bitter memory of a beautiful ancestress’ who ‘played fast and loose with men’s hearts’ and so neglected her baby daughter that the poor infant died.

Clarice Ainslie is utterly heartless; she cares for nobody but herself. She is also terrified of everything old and determined to remain young forever, so she agrees to become the guinea pig for Dr Head’s ‘Arrested Age’ experimental treatment. Far from being put off by the extremely high financial cost of the treatment, the doctor’s frank description of what she will have to endure—including the removal of all her teeth and virtual imprisonment within his home—or the length of time it will take to complete the process, Clarice forges ahead without giving any of it much thought. But there is a price to pay for such obsessive vanity… and it is a high one.

According to The Graphic (September 1900)...‘The novel contains many excellent morals, concerning the vanity of Vanity, the expediency of kindness to dumb animals, the inexpediency of joining murder-societies, the imprudence of trusting to quacks, and the folly of being born without brains.’

Published: 20 November 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-917113-05-2.
Case laminate hardback, 22.86mm x 15.24cm (6" x 9"), 176 pages.

The book is available to pre-order from the Nezu Press store (please click here). Alternatively, it will be available from the usual online retailers, and you can order it from bricks-and-mortar stores. It is already at Amazon UK (please click here) and US (please click here).

The new Nezu Press edition alongside the original first edition of 1900.

By the Night Express and Other Tales, etc. ~ Keith Fleming

I am extremely pleased—and that is a huge understatement—to announce that on the spookiest day of the year Nezu Press will publish two volumes of stories by Keith Fleming (pseudonym of female author K. E. Fitz-Patrick). And both will include my 21-page biographical essay—‘Most Unassuming in Demeanour’: The Life of K. E. Fitz-Patrick—which reveals a large amount of new information about the writer’s background and life.

   

Until now, next to nothing was known about Miss Fitz-Patrick. When I first began looking for information about her, I had very little to go on. I thought I might find a few choice morsels to shed a little light on her life, but I didn't dare hope for more than that—I certainly wasn't expecting what I did find. And now you can read all about her.

The stories contained in the two volumes are as follows:

By the Night Express and Other Tales:

The novellas ‘By the Night Express’, ‘Dolores’, and ‘Love Stronger than Death’. 

The novel “Can Such Things Be?”.

The short stories ‘So Innocent’, ‘The Transfiguration of Lettice Willoughby’, and ‘The Red Skirt’.

At the Eleventh Hour and Other Tales:

The novels At the Eleventh Hour and The Sins of the Fathers.

The short stories ‘The Courage of Kathie’, ‘An Audacious Wager’, and ‘Garth Austin’s Strategy’.

And the dust jacket of each volume features a wonderful painting by Edward Miller (Les Edwards), of whom I have been a great fan since I was knee-high to a grasshopper.

The sensation novel The Sins of the Fathers (which does have supernatural elements) was originally published in instalments in various newspapers from 1893; it was never published in book form, and it has never been republished in any format. All six short stories appeared in periodicals, and none of them have been republished before (I should point out that the short stories are not supernatural).

Both books are available to pre-order from the Nezu Press store (By the Night Express | At the Eleventh Hour). Alternatively, they are available from the usual online retailers, and you can order them from bricks-and-mortar stores. They're already at Amazon UK (click here: By the Night Express | At the Eleventh Hour).

The Uncanny House & The Forsaken House at Misty Vale ~ Mary L. Pendered

Nezu Press is bringing out two books in August, both by Mary L. Pendered. A well-known author during her lifetime, she has been almost forgotten since her death, and her books are extremely difficult to get hold of. One of our new titles, The Forsaken House at Misty Vale, is so rare that you're unlikely to ever see a copy of the first edition in the wild.

The Uncanny House was first published in 1927, and The Forsaken House at Misty Vale came out in 1932. Neither of these novels has been republished since its first publication. Please note that both of the new Nezu Press editions contain the same 20-page biographical essay by me: ‘Mary L. Pendered: Author, Suffragist, Pacifist, and Thoroughly Good Woman’.

The Uncanny House

Old Mr Barker was a curmudgeon who underfed his dogs to make them vicious and kept his low-paid staff loyal with promises of legacies that never materialised. Following his death, his home is sold at auction for an absurdly cheap price to Peggy and Percy Dacre. But when the young couple move into their new home with their four children, Peggy soon discovers that The Beeches—commonly referred to as ‘Hell Corner’ by the locals—is already occupied.

Published: 20 August 2024.
978-1-917113-01-4.
Hardback with dust jacket, 228 pages.
Click here to buy from Nezu Press.

The Forsaken House at Misty Vale

Celia Grey, a fifty-year-old, unmarried writer who has longed for a home of her own for decades, thinks all her prayers have been answered when she inherits her uncle’s house. But Clew Lodge is a property with an uncanny reputation. It is a grim and daunting place, desolate and derelict, having been left to the forces of corruption since Uncle Jerrold abandoned it a decade prior to his death—because he ‘could not stand the whispering’.

Published: 20 August 2024.
978-1-917113-02-1.
Hardback with dust jacket, 306 pages.
Click here to buy from Nezu Press.

Both books will be available from the usual online retailers soon. They are available to pre-order from the Nezu Press website right now (see links above).