WILLIAM LE QUEUX AT
ASH RARE BOOKS
43 HURON ROAD
LONDON SW17 8RE
UNITED KINGDOM

London : Ward, Lock & Bowden, 1896. First edition in this form. His first novel having been banned in Russia, Le Queux dedicated his second to the Tzar – the sensational but highly sympathetic memoirs of a Jewish Russian nihilist activist. “That I have been compelled to bestow fictitious names upon the actors in these dramas, add and suppress certain incidents, and change the scene in more than one instance, is obvious; nevertheless, I anticipate that many will recognise in Anton Prèhznev’s stories solutions of more than one sensational mystery that has startled Europe”. Twelve of the fifteen extraordinary individual tales, many set in London, had earlier appeared in “Strange Tales of a Nihilist” (1892), but all have here been revised and to some extent re-written; two now appear under different titles, and three have been added, including “The Velvet Paw” – on a foggy December evening in London, Prèhznev is followed on to the underground at Temple tube station by a tall auburn-haired young woman, dressed all in black.
Crown 8vo (20cm). 320pp. Original green decorative pictorial cloth, lettered in gilt on spine, and blocked and lettered in red and black; lightly rubbed; endpapers a little tanned, but a very good copy of an uncommon title – most of the institutional copies being of the “colonial edition” in a plain binding. W. H. Smith & Son blind-stamp and contemporary (London 1896) ownership inscription of Stewart Foulis.

£200

To purchase, call us or e-mail us at books@ashrare.com quoting stock number 45450 – or simply click on the button

London : Eveleigh Nash, 1906. First edition. A fictional tour-de-force from Le Queux with an exhaustively researched account of an all too plausible German invasion – communication beyond Beccles cut off, further landings at Hull and Goole, desperate fighting in Essex, Colchester abandoned, the Battle of Epping, the Fall of London, revolts in Shoreditch and Islington, etc. Le Queux was aided by “a number of the highest authorities on strategy”, including Field Marshall Earl Roberts, former Commander in Chief, who provides an introductory letter, as well as the naval historian Herbert Wrigley Wilson, who contributes the chapters on the fighting at sea. Originally serialised in the “Daily Mail”, with questions asked in the House over the need to suppress it, the book became an extraordinary international success, translated into multiple languages.
Post 8vo (21cm). [2],xiv,550,[ii]pp. Numerous maps and plans. Facsimiles. Original red cloth, lettered in gilt and blocked in blind; a few slight marks; a touch sunned; endpapers a little tanned; some spotting of edges and prelims, but overall a very good copy of one the best and most famous examples of the imaginary invasion genre. Contemporary ownership inscription of George W. H. Crook and faint W. H. Smith blind-stamp on front free endpaper.

SOLD

London : Robert Holden & Co., [1924]. First edition. The usual Le Queux fare – Sir Hugh Sassari, criminal mastermind of Berkeley Square, Master of the World with strange and appalling powers – but some interesting and informed background on the very early days of broadcasting and the BBC. The action opens in the “artistic studio” of the British Broadcasting Company in York.
Crown 8vo (20cm). 285,[iii]pp (including integral endpapers). Original blue cloth; some mild rubbing; a few faint marks; some spotting, mainly to edges and prelims, but a very good and still bright copy. Small contemporary bookseller’s label of Philip, Son & Nephew of Church Street, Liverpool, at rear.

SOLD