Master of modern occultism, Lon Milo DuQuette, (author of "Enochian Vision Magick" and "The Magick of Aleister Crowley") introduces the newest Weiser Books Collection - "The Magical Antiquarian Curiosity Shoppe." Culled from material long unavailable to the general public, DuQuette curates this essential new digital library with the eye of a scholar and the insight of an initiate. Part I - "The Repairer of Reputations" The year is 1895, and you've just picked up a new book describing life in New York City 25 years in the future - a future United States that is prosperous, and the Federal government has evolved into a mild military dictatorship; a future where suicide is institutionalized, and publicly funded "Lethal Chambers" are constructed in all large cities to humanely terminate the existence of those sad and unproductive citizens for whom life has become intolerable, a future in which two very determined conspirators will risk everything to place the rightful King of America on his throne. Sound like a disturbing vision? The madness has begun. This is the book that inspired H.P. Lovecraft."
Author
Robert William Chambers was an American artist and writer. Chambers was first educated at the Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute,and then entered the Art Students' League at around the age of twenty, where the artist Charles Dana Gibson was his fellow student. Chambers studied at the École des Beaux-Arts, and at Académie Julian, in Paris from 1886 to 1893, and his work was displayed at the Salon as early as 1889. On his return to New York, he succeeded in selling his illustrations to Life, Truth, and Vogue magazines. Then, for reasons unclear, he devoted his time to writing, producing his first novel, In the Quarter (written in 1887 in Munich). His most famous, and perhaps most meritorious, effort is The King in Yellow, a collection of weird short stories, connected by the theme of the fictitious drama The King in Yellow, which drives those who read it insane. Chambers returned to the weird genre in his later short story collections The Maker of Moons and The Tree of Heaven, but neither earned him such success as The King in Yellow. Chambers later turned to writing romantic fiction to earn a living. According to some estimates, Chambers was one of the most successful literary careers of his period, his later novels selling well and a handful achieving best-seller status. Many of his works were also serialized in magazines. After 1924 he devoted himself solely to writing historical fiction. Chambers for several years made Broadalbin his summer home. Some of his novels touch upon colonial life in Broadalbin and Johnstown. On July 12, 1898, he married Elsa Vaughn Moller (1882-1939). They had a son, Robert Edward Stuart Chambers (later calling himself Robert Husted Chambers) who also gained some fame as an author. Chambers died at his home in the village of Broadalbin, New York, on December 16th 1933.
