Often hailed as the best French science fiction writer of the early 20th century, Maurice Renard coined the term "Scientific Marvel Fiction" to pen a series of gripping, ground-breaking stories that owe as much to Edgar Allan Poe as they do to H.-G. Wells. Until now, Renard was best known to the English-speaking public for his thrice-filmed thriller, The Hands of Orlac. The Master of Light (1933), anticipating Bob Shaw's slow glass, is a murder mystery solved thanks to luminite, a glass-like substance which slows down light as it passes through, and through which one can actually witness the past. It is the fifth of a series of five volumes, translated and annotated by Brian Stableford, devoted to presenting the classic works of this pioneering giant of French science fiction.