Dr. Fu-Manchu, the master of fiendish deaths, and now a member of the Sacred Order of the White Peacock, has returned. Nayland Smith and Dr. Petrie must somehow thwart his evil plans to take over the world.
The Fu-Manchu stories began as a serial in British papers. The first story, "The Zayat Kiss," was published in The Story Teller in October, 1912. In 1913, the serial stories were collected and published as a book entitled "The Mystery of Dr. Fu-Manchu" in the United Kingdom. Also in 1913, the Fu-Manchu stories began to be serialized in the United States. "The Zayat Kiss" was published in the February 15, 1913 issue of Collier's. Later in 1913, Rohmer slightly rewrote the stories to remove the serialization and turn them into chapters for "The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu", which was published in the U.S.
After the success of The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu, Rohmer followed with The Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu in 1916 and The Hand of Dr. Fu-Manchu in 1917.