The Mummy!, or A Tale of the Twenty-Second Century

Brandon Fraser, eat your heart out!What an odd, entertaining book this is. Written probably the cash in the success of Frankenstein, Jane Webb Loudon wrote it as a political satire and a tale of the supernatural. Distinguished because it is the first novel to feature the creature of the Living Mummy, the story centers around a corrupt English government in the year 2126, and Cheops, the resurrected-by-a-mad-scientist, 3000 year-old Mummy's attempts to fix it to earn a redemption from his accursed past.In the meantime, there are battles that spark thoughts of Braveheart, and the whole thing is a fascinating mix of comedy, Gothic horror, politics, and science fiction. I am surprised this didn't become a great literary classic, ranked up there with Dracula and Frankenstein. Indeed, this story is equal to them in just about every way. Way ahead of its time both socially and in intelligence, thanks to this recent re-print, however, Jane Loudon's The Mummy has a chance to emerge in the full glory that it deserves!