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Antony Ferrara heats his quarters like an inferno, collects brain-eating beetles, and wears an Egyptian ring. So, why does Cairn suspect him of killing a swan? Sax Rohmer, today on The Classic Tales Podcast.

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We won a podcast award! The Academy of Interactive and Visual Arts has awarded The Classic Tales Podcast with a Gold Award! Juried by some titans from the top media firms, (Disney, Conde Nast, Microsoft, etc.), I share this honor with Trevor Noah\\u2019s Daily Show Podcast, MTV\\u2019s Official Challenge Podcast, Broadway Podcast Network and a few others. Only the top 10% of those who entered were awarded the Gold Award. We are super psyched about that.

813, the fourth novel in the Ars\\xe8ne Lupin series is also now available! Head on over to classictalesaudiobooks.com and pick up this fantastic adventure! And if you\\u2019d like to save 2 dollars when you get 813, simply enter the coupon code: podcast. No subscription, no additional purchase necessary, just enter the word podcast, and save 2 bucks. Thank you for your support!

Today\\u2019s story is from the creator of the Fu-Manchu series, Sax Rohmer. It was originally titled, The Brood of the Witch-Queen. I think that the unfortunate title is the reason that this book is not more well know today. That, and the ending isn\\u2019t super great. Just putting that out there right now. But H.P. Lovecraft compared this book with Bram Stoker\\u2019s Dracula, and many critics of the time considered it one of Rohmer\\u2019s best. I\\u2019ve taken the liberty of releasing it as Knight of the Necropolis. Hopefully ol\\u2019 Sax isn\\u2019t turning too much in his grave at that.

One of the things that really draws me to classic Halloween monsters is that they are steeped in literature. Obviously, Dracula and Frankenstein immediately come to mind with their respective baddies. There are many werewolf short stories, from Kipling\\u2019s The Mark of the Beast, to Murryat\\u2019s The White Wolf of the Harz Mountains. Alexandre Dumas even wrote a full length, lack luster novel about a werewolf, clumsily translated as The Wolf Leader. I\\u2019m told Steinbeck also wrote a werewolf yarn.

Mummy tales also abound in short fiction. Among the best are Conan Doyle\\u2019s Lot No. 249, Louisa May Alcott\\u2019s The Ring of Thoth, and H.P. Lovecraft\\u2019s Imprisoned with the Pharaohs. Among the less successful is Bram Stoker\\u2019s novel Jewel of the Seven Stars.

Now, today\\u2019s story isn\\u2019t perfect by any means. It\\u2019s not high literature. But when I read it, I felt that it really delivered the same feeling that I get when I watch the original movie of The Mummy, with Boris Karloff. It\\u2019s set up as a series of adventures where we can eventually piece together the identity of that devotee of ancient sorcery: Antony Ferrara. The similarities to Dracula are evident. Nobody believes in Egyptian sorcery, there\\u2019s only one scholar who\\u2019s studied enough to stop him, etc.. But what can I say, when it comes to magic rings, brain-eating beetles, vampires, ancient curses, Egyptian mummies, and the like, I\\u2019m always up for it. I hope you are, too.

And now, The Knight of the Necropolis, Part 1 of 8, by Sax Rohmer.

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