Snuggly Tales of Femmes Fatales

Snuggly Tales of Femmes Fatales

 

edited and translated by Brian Stableford

 

 

“And me, what have I done? I had the age of their illusions and their desires made me young. Beautiful in their amour, I smiled at their dream and my smile protected them against death by smiling at them. Today, the number of years forgotten in my presence and the weight of their regret is overwhelming me, their awakening has aged me by a thousand years, and now I am condemned to live for a thousand years, hideous and sad, the life that each of them might have lived down here.” —Jean Lorrain, “Oriane Vanquished”

 

Gathered together in the present volume, edited and translated from the French by Brian Stableford, are seventeen tales of femmes fatales, many of which have never appeared in English before.

From the pioneering “The Amorous Revenant” by Théophile Gautier, to Jules Lermina’s horrific “The Titaness,” this significant sampling of those seductively attractive females who lead men into problematic positions will be sure to appeal to connoisseurs of dark fairy tales, fin-de-siècle decadence, and those who simply revel in the frissons offered by this irresistible antiquarian subgenre.

 

About the Editor
Brian Stableford has been publishing fiction and non-fiction for fifty years. His fiction includes a series of “tales of the biotech revolution” and a series of metaphysical fantasies featuring Edgar Poe’s Auguste Dupin. His most recent non-fiction projects are New Atlantis: A Narrative History of Scientific Romance (Wildside Press, 2016) and The Plurality of Imaginary Worlds: The Evolution of French roman scientifique (Black Coat Press, 2016); in association with the latter he has translated approximately a hundred and fifty volumes of texts not previously available in English, similarly issued by Black Coat Press.

He has translated for Snuggly Books a number of titles, including The Soul-Drinker and Other Decadent Fantasies by Jean Lorrain, and The Unknown Collaborator and Other Legendary Tales by Victor Joly.

 

Contents:

  • Introduction
  • The Fay Lubantine, by CATHERINE DURAND
  • The Seminarist, by S. HENRY BERTHOUD
  • The Amorous Revenant, by THÉOPHILE GAUTIER
  • The Willis, by ALPHONSE KARR
  • An Old Story, by CHARLES BARBARA
  • The Titaness, by JULES LERMINA
  • The Widowhood of Scheherazade, by HENRI DE RÉGNIER
  • The Mirror, by JEAN RICHEPIN
  • The Idol, by FRÉDÉRIC BOUTET
  • Ennoia, by ANDRÉ LEBEY
  • Wedding Night, by CATULLE MENDÈS
  • The Blue Woman, by G. ALBERT AURIER
  • Oriane Vanquished, by JEAN LORRAIN
  • Lisbeth, by GASTON DANVILLE
  • The Saurienne, by RENÉE VIVIEN
  • The King of Persia, by MAURICE MAGRE
  • The Rendezvous, by MAURICE RENARD

 

 

Paperback, 296 pages. Release date: July 19, 2022
ISBN-13: 978-1-64525-100-2
Price: US$20.00