The Sorceress of the Strand and Other Stories

Book excerpt: In 1898, The Strand Magazine, one of the most influential publications of the Victorian fin de siècle, deemed best-selling author and editor L.T. Meade a literary “celebrity” and “one of the most industrious writers of modern fiction.” Beginning in 1893 and continuing into the first decade of the twentieth century, Meade’s medical mysteries and thrilling tales of dangerous criminal women appeared in The Strand. There they competed successfully not only with Arthur Conan Doyle’s Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, but also with the works of the most popular writers of the day. The Sorceress of the Strand is one of Meade’s most compelling mysteries, and the first to feature the seductive criminal genius Madame Sara. The Sorceress of the Strand is accompanied in this edition by three other popular stories featuring powerful female criminal protagonists, from gang leaders to spies and terrorists. The historical appendices expand on the stories’ themes of criminality, gender, and political activism. Twenty-eight of the original periodical illustrations are included.