This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. M. Laszlo will be awarding a $15 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.
This metaphysical novel, like its predecessor, Anastasia’s Midnight Song, is a mix of stream of consciousness narration and imaginary happenings. Mystical and mysterious, The Nameless Land follows the misadventures of Rupert Lux and Anastasia T Grace.
Rupert, a young New Zealander working as a night clerk in a hotel in Sinai, is beset by a daemon that in habits his eye. His delusion is much the same as Anastasia’s was when she was tormented by the Arctic fox and the diadem spider in the earlier book.
Anastasia, now blind, travels to Sinai at the behest of a Spiritualist Society to seek hidden treasure by dowsing. She longs to find someone she can heal and love. Perhaps Rupert is the one she can save and thereby save herself.
But Rupert is plagued by females who seem to blend into one another and appear and disappear at will. Traumatised by childhood abuse, he worries that he is not worthy of love. He races headlong through many strange encounters, while Anastasia maintains a calmer stance, though troubled by what she is being coerced into doing. She has been urged to find lost Egyptian treasure and, though reluctant, manages to do so. A sense of menace attends the discovery.
Both protagonists are troubled by wild imaginings and beset by odd visions, smells, sounds, and touches as the pair descend into hallucinatory madness. This is a fast-paced metaphysical adventure, the events hiding many layers of emotional turmoil and insanity. The reader is whisked through a dreamlike landscape, disoriented, and made to experience a kind of madness themselves.
The Nameless Land, the second volume in Anastasia’s story and a follow-up to Anastasia’s Midnight Song, continues the author’s exploration of the fragile boundaries between dream and reality. While familiarity with the first book provides a deeper understanding of Anastasia’s character, this novel can be read and appreciated on its own.
Now blind, Anastasia falls prey to a circle of spiritualists who exploit her in their pursuit of hidden treasures. Her deepest longing is freedom—yet each time she escapes one form of captivity, she finds herself ensnared by another. Rupert Lux, a hotel clerk in Sinai who has long admired Anastasia from afar, hopes to be the one to set her free. However, he too must confront his own inner daemon, a presence that blurs the edges of perception and plunges him into visions and hallucinations.
Mr. Laszlo weaves a narrative that is both lyrical and unsettling, inviting readers into a landscape where madness and clarity coexist. Beneath its dreamlike surface lies a profound meditation on loneliness, desire, and the enduring scars left by past abuse. Both Anastasia and Rupert struggle not only against external forces but also against their own fractured psyches.
The Nameless Land is not a light read, but it is a rewarding one—beautifully written, richly layered, and deserving of multiple readings to appreciate its full depth. Readers who enjoy psychological complexity, atmospheric prose, and an undercurrent of the gothic will find much to admire here.
Rupert awoke to the sound of panting coming from outside. For a moment, he wondered if the party in question might be an excited dog. A strong gust rippled through the rooftop, and the heavy breathing grew louder—as if the creature had dared to draw near. Sure enough, a swift, elongated silhouette passed by the sick tent’s east wall. And the visitor boasted a cone-shaped horn. I’ll be damned, Rupert thought. He wondered if the entity might be some mythical beast. When he sat up, he checked to see if anyone else were awake. No, I’m the only one. He rubbed his right eye for a while before creeping outside—where the wild nighttime breeze played through his nightshirt.
At last, he dragged himself around the corner: the mysterious presence proved to be a jackal. He focused on the anomalous horn itself and made the sign of the cross. It’s a miracle. What a beauty, too, the extraordinary beast: it had a pelt that shone a creamy gold streaked with magnolia white. Awestruck, Rupert bowed to the godlike animal. ‘Hello.’
The jackal twitched its long, pointed ears. As if enthralled, the creature shook and shivered. Had it detected the presence within Rupert’s eyeball? Before long, the jackal retreated down the moonlit path before pausing to shoot him a backward glance.
He twitched his moustache. ‘You wish to show me something? Or maybe you wish to teach me the laws of the jungle. Or maybe you wish to bring me to a proper field hospital, eh?’
The jackal emitted a lonesome howl, soon answered by a distant chorus of howls. When the others grew quiet, the jackal panted anew and guided Rupert far beyond the sick-tent grounds.
M. Laszlo is the pseudonym of a reclusive author living in Bath, Ohio. According to rumor, he based the pen name on the name of the Paul Henreid character in Casablanca, Victor Laszlo.
M. Laszlo has lived and worked all over the world, and he has kept exhaustive journals and idea books corresponding to each location and post.
It is said that the maniacal habit began in childhood during summer vacations—when his family began renting out Robert Lowell’s family home in Castine, Maine. Rumor has it he still possesses those childhood diaries and plans to release a trilogy set in the Pine Tree State.
The habit continued into the 1980s when he lived in London, England (the summer of 1985.) The idea books and journals from that summer inspired his first work The Phantom Glare of Day published by the hybrid Spark Press in 2022.
The habit continued into the 1990s when he lived in the Muslim Quarter of Jerusalem and worked as a night clerk in a Palestinian youth hostel. In recent years, he revisited that very journal/idea book and based Anastasia’s Midnight Song and The Nameless Land on the characters, topics, and themes contained within the writings.
At the end of the decade, M. Laszlo attended Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, New York and earned an M.F.A degree in poetry. During his time in New York, he kept the idea books and journals that formed the basis of his second release, On the Threshold, published by the acclaimed Australian hybrid now known as Alkira. That house released Anastasia’s Midnight Song on 17 January 2025. The Nameless Land serves as a stand-alone sequel and releases on 5 December 2025.
M. Laszlo has lived and worked in New York City, East Jerusalem, and several other cities around the world. While living in the Middle East, he worked for Harvard University’s Semitic Museum. He holds a bachelor’s degree in English from Hiram College in Hiram, Ohio and an M.F.A. in poetry from Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, New York.
