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Set in the Limehouse area of London, Dope is a story of Chinatown and the drug traffic and concerns itself with cannabis use. It is based on the story of Billie Carleton, a young English actress whose scandalous lifestyle ended with her death from a drug overdose. It is Rohmer's most popular novel, and generally voted a better story than any of the Fu-Manchu books, has taxed the vocabularies of all the reviewers in the country to find the right word to describe its thrilling appeal.
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Arthur Henry Sarsfield Ward (1883 - 1959), better known as Sax Rohmer, was a prolific English novelist. He is best remembered for his series of novels featuring the master criminal Dr. Fu Manchu. Born in Birmingham to a working-class family, Arthur Ward initially pursued a career as a civil servant before concentrating on writing full-time. He worked as a poet, songwriter and comedy sketch writer for music hall performers before creating the Sax Rohmer persona and pursuing a career writing fiction. Like his contemporaries Algernon Blackwood and Arthur Machen, Rohmer claimed membership to one of the factions of the qabbalistic Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. Rohmer also claimed ties to the Rosicrucians, but the validity of his claims has been questioned. His doctor and family friend Dr R. Watson Councell may have been his only legitimate connection to such organizations. His first published work came in 1903, when the short story "The Mysterious Mummy" was sold to Pearson's Weekly. Rohmer's main literary influences seem to have been Edgar Allan Poe, Arthur Conan Doyle and M. P. Shiel. He gradually transitioned from writing for music hall performers to concentrating on short stories and serials for magazine publication. In 1909 he married Rose Elizabeth Knox. He published his first book Pause! anonymously in 1910.
