Career
He began his career as a journalist in 1859. He published a number of Edgar Allan Poe-inspired collections, Histoires Incroyables (1885), Nouvelles Histoires Incroyables (1888) and a short novel, L"Élixir de Vie (1890) (translated by Brian Stableford and included in Panic in Paris). Le Secret des Zippelius (1893) (translated by Brian Stableford as The Secret of Zippelius (2011) ) featured the controlled disintegration of water.
His two-volume Louisiana Bataille de Strasbourg (1895) was one of the first novels on the theme of the yellow peril.
In L"Effrayante Aventure (1910) (translated by Brian Stableford, ), Lermina used Bulwer-Lytton"s vril-force to create a vril-powered flying machine. The novel also features the resurrection of prehistoric creatures frozen in ice in caverns under Paris.
Lermina also penned a proto-Tarzan novel, To-Ho le Tueur d"Or (1905) (translated by Georges T. Dodds as To-Ho and the Gold Destroyers, two sequels to the popular classic The Count of Monte-Cristo: Le Fils de Monte-Cristo (1881), Le Trésor de Monte-Cristo (1885), and Les Mystères de New York (1874), also written under the pseudonym of William Cobb. He also created the indomitable Toto Fouinard, whose adventures were serialized in 1908-1909.