"Congratulate the Devil is a delightful comic novel by forgotten Welsh fantasy writer Howell Davies. Rescued from obscurity by the Library of Wales this amusing tale of mind control proves to be something of a lost gem. ... the most surprising... addition to the Library of Wales series so far."
babylonwales.com

Crynodeb:
Starling knows a chemist called Roper, who knows a painter called Jourbert, who knows a man in Mexico who works for the government. Mescal has always had its routes into the world. There has been a new shipment, but not quite what anyone expected. This is a new drug. It opens the doors of perception for a man like Roper hiding away in his north London laboratory. He can make people work for him, turn his friends into fools or murderers, if only he could control his own mind.... Anita is such a beautiful woman but she could never love a man like Roper...

Power, pleasure, always corrupt...

Nodiadau bywgraffyddol:
Ganed Howell Davies ym 1896 ar fferm yn Felingwm ger Caerfyrddin. Ymunodd â’r Ffiwsilwyr Brenhinol Cymreig ar ei 18fed pen-blwydd ym 1914 a gwasanaethodd drwy gydol y Rhyfel Byd Cyntaf, cafodd ei glwyfo ddwywaith a derbyniodd gomiswin fel capten. Fe’i addysgwyd ym Mhrifysgolion y Sorbonne, Rhydychen ac Aberystwyth, daeth yn newyddiadurwr llawrydd a golygydd ar gyfer amrywiaeth eang o gyhoeddiadau a sefydliadau. Ef oedd golygydd The South American Handbook, o 1923 hyd 1972. Ei weithiau mwyaf adnabyddus yw’r tair nofel a gyhoeddwyd gan Gollancz cyn i’r Ail Ryfel Byd gychwyn, yn benodol Minimum Man (1938), a gyhoeddwyd fel cyfres yn eang. Dilynwyd hyn ym 1939 gan Three Men Make a World a Congratulate the Devil. Bu farw Howell Davies ym 1985.

Rhagflas byr

‘No, no, I’m Welsh actually’ is always my riposte when accused of being English, partly to avert the cliché of being just one more Englishman living in New York, but mostly as homage to the very Welshness of my grandfather Howell Davies. This notable Welshness was not a question of mere nationality, though he was born on the hills of Felingwm, nor of language, though he indeed spoke and wrote Welsh with pride and accomplishment, but rather of character and attitude, his unique approach the whole thing of it.
Darllenwch y rhagair cyfan i Congratulate the Devil YMA...

Mwy o wybodaeth a sylwadau:
‘For that was the worst of being Welsh, once you got into the spirit of a thing, and though you began by acting, in a moment, quick as anything, you were serious and inside the skin of the song, mournful as midnight and feeling a black sort of ecstasy...’