In 1890, British author Hall Caine published his novel The Bondman to tremendous critical and commercial success. For decades, it was adapted repeatedly for stage and screen. But now, nearly a century after Caine’s death, the novel, like its author, is all but forgotten. And why? In short, it’s incredibly dull — by today’s standards — telling the tired story of two brothers who love the same woman.

Like many Victorian novels, the writing is sentimental and dripping with melodrama. Its heroes, though straight, emote to the point of camp. And that’s precisely where H the Shadow begins. It erases the boring parts of The Bondman and makes what’s left over into a poem. In so doing, it amplifies the novel’s absurdity to the nth degree, transforming an inoffensive snore into a wild, homoerotic romp.

Gone are the picturesque fishing villages of the Isle of Man and Iceland, where The Bondman is set, and in their place, readers will find a weird country full of sex maniacs and murderers, demonic possessions, voices from the beyond, and people who, for some reason, turn into horses. H the Shadow is a fever dream that certainly won’t appear in the West End or a cinema anytime soon.