Federico Andahazi's first novel established him as a writer of wit, verve and mastery. His new novel, The Merciful Women , which sold in eleven countries, mines the same vein of forgotten and invented history, this time in a brilliant retelling of the birth of the Gothic novel.

In the summer of 1816, Percy and Mary Shelley, Mary's sister, and Lord Byron hid themselves inside a Swiss villa, whiling away rainy afternoons with a Gothic novel writing contest. In Andahazi's 'reimagining', there was a fifth competitor, John Polidori, Byron's manservant, a talentless would-be writer resentful of the ease of his master's life. Through a Faustian pact with an unseen benefactor, Polidori writes the most compelling vampire story every written, which he will read aloud the night Mary Shelley first unveils Frankenstein . But The Vampyre has striking similarities to Polidori's benefactor and to what she asks of him in return. Opium, erotica, and decadence meld into a sly and stylish novel about literary ambition, talent, and inspiration.