Benita (novel)

The novel was first published in serial form in Cassell's Magazine in the December 1905 through May 1906 issues; the first hardcover edition followed from Cassell & Company, London, 7 September 1906.[2][3] Cassell reissued the title in 1920 and 1926. Subsequent British editions were published by Chariot Books in 1952[3] and Macdonald & Co. in 1965.[2] An ebook edition was issued by Project Gutenberg in March 2006.[3]

The first U.S. edition was published by Longmans, Green and Co. in 1906 under the alternate title The Spirit of Bambatse, A Romance, which was Haggard's preferred title and was used for most later American editions.[2][3] The significance of the collection was recognized by its republication (also as The Spirit of Bambatse) by the Newcastle Publishing Company as the twenty-second volume of the Newcastle Forgotten Fantasy Library series in October, 1979. The Newcastle edition was reissued by Wildside Press in February 2001.[3][4]

The novel has also been gathered together with Haggard's Ayesha: The Return of She (1905) into the omnibus collection Ayesha: The Return of She / Benita: An African Romance (New Orchard, 1989).[3]

In an adventure mingling romance and the supernatural, the clairvoyant heroine Benita assists in a hunt for a lost Portuguese treasure buried in the Transvaal.

E. F. Bleiler described Benita as "a good adventure story, but without the power or depth of Haggard's other work."[5]

• Complete book at Project Gutenberg
• The Spirit of Bambatse public domain audiobook at LibriVox