The Lady in the Car (Mint Editions (Short Story Collections and Anthologies))

The Lady in the Car (1908) is a novel by Anglo-French writer William Le Queux. Published at the height of Le Queux’s career as a leading author of popular thrillers, The Lady in the Car is a story of romance, adventure, and international crime. Using his own research and experience as a journalist and adventurer, Le Queux crafts an accessible, entertaining world for readers in search of a literary escape. Known for his works of fiction and nonfiction on the possibility of Germany invading Britain―a paranoia common in the early twentieth century―William Le Queux also wrote dozens of thrillers and adventure novels for a dedicated public audience. Although critical acclaim eluded him, popular success made him one of England’s bestselling writers. In The Lady in the Car, the narrator reveals his firsthand knowledge of the shadowy figure known across Europe as Prince Albert of Hesse-Holstein―in addition to a number of other elaborate aliases. Renowned for his international connections, debonair attitude, and remarkable generosity, the Prince is a smooth criminal who, with the help of his trusted accomplices, runs a lucrative criminal enterprise in broad daylight. Gifted with a chameleon-like ability to change his appearance, the Prince targets wealthy men and women looking for a way to raise their influence in aristocratic society. Using his state-of-the-art Mercedes as both a symbol of his power and a powerful getaway vehicle, the Prince is more than happy to oblige the fantasies of those with wealth to spare. When an unsuspecting victim turns out to be an extremely powerful woman, the Prince and his gang of thieves find themselves scrambling to not only keep their operation secret, but to keep themselves from going to prison for the rest of their lives. This edition of William Le Queux’s The Lady in the Car is a classic novel reimagined for modern readers.

Since our inception in 2020, Mint Editions has kept sustainability and innovation at the forefront of our mission. Each and every Mint Edition title gets a fresh, professionally typeset manuscript and a dazzling new cover, all while maintaining the integrity of the original book.

With thousands of titles in our collection, we aim to spotlight diverse public domain works to help them find modern audiences. Mint Editions celebrates a breadth of literary works, curated from both canonical and overlooked classics from writers around the globe.

William Le Queux (1864-1927) was an Anglo-French journalist, novelist, and radio broadcaster. Born in London to a French father and English mother, Le Queux studied art in Paris and embarked on a walking tour of Europe before finding work as a reporter for various French newspapers. Towards the end of the 1880s, he returned to London where he edited Gossip and Piccadilly before being hired as a reporter for The Globe in 1891. After several unhappy years, he left journalism to pursue his creative interests. Le Queux made a name for himself as a leading writer of popular fiction with such espionage thrillers as The Great War in England in 1897 (1894) and The Invasion of 1910 (1906). In addition to his writing, Le Queux was a notable pioneer of early aviation and radio communication, interests he maintained while publishing around 150 novels over his decades long career.