Just Finished re-Reading: The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (FP: 1927) [293pp] 

Running to an even dozen stories this is the last set of Sherlock Holmes stories produced by the author after bowing to public pressure to produce more adventures for his fan base. This also means, of course, that it’s the last of the buddy-reads with Marian over @ Classics Considered. It's been a fun re-read over the year and I’m really glad we decided on doing this. Holmes is one of my three founding hero figures so it was good to reconnect after over 40 years. 

As usual with these things the stories are quite a mix of the Gothic, the simply mysterious and the criminal. One story in particular came as a bit of a surprise - The Adventure of the Blanched Soldier – as it was written by Holmes himself rather than, as usual, by Watson. It was interesting that despite (obviously) being penned by the same author it had quite a different ‘tone’. This was one of the gothic pieces and, as is common in these stories, had a link to the Empire, in this case South Africa which ACD knew well as he served there during the Boer War. 

One comment in particular made me LOL during the telling of The Adventure of the Mazarian Stone when Holmes shouted out “No violence gentlemen. Consider the furniture.” No doubt his rooms 221b had been set up just as he liked it and he didn’t want to waste his time furniture shopping! I think The Problem of Thor Bridge was probably my favourite story of the bunch. Not only was it very atmospheric but also very clever and hinged on a small, apparently insignificant, anomaly at the crime scene. I was impressed at ACD’s ingenuity.  

The Adventure of the Creeping Man (or should that be ‘creepy’ man) was interesting for a number of reasons – firstly that it gave some insight into Edwardian dating practices (and expectations) and also highlighted some fanciful pseudo-science. ACD should have known better... But it did show that the fear of the loss of male virility as age advances is FAR from new. The Adventure of the Veiled Lodger was another interesting one highlighting as it did Holmes’ basic humanity. It also dropped some interesting statistics – the fact that Holmes had been ‘in practice’ for 25 years and that Watson had been taking notes for 17 of them. Presumably Holmes had been operating for 5 years before Watson arrived on the scene? 

Lastly, The Adventure of the Retired Colourman had an interesting comment: Excellence at chess is the mark of a scheming mind! That’s good to know. I’m passable at chess but have never, thankfully, achieved anything close to excellence. 

Overall, this was a good to very good collection of Holmesian tales and I enjoyed them quite a lot. Being Edwardian rather than Victorian at this point I couldn’t help but notice how often the telephone made its way into the story and how access to that technology – growing more common throughout that age – affected the story. One other thing that I couldn’t help but notice (and honestly expect) was the occasional hint of racism or antisemitism sprinkled her and there. Although it did make me wrinkle my nose a bit, I’m glad they left it in so that we, as readers, can see how much we’ve progressed away from such things. 

Of course, after reading nine Holmes books over the last year, I’m going to miss the guys and their adventures. Fortunately, I have other options to continue my love of the characters and their interactions in what I’m called ‘Holmes Adjacent’ literature. I won’t be reading this quite as often as the original stories (other plans will intervene) but I will be dropping in at least a few such books per year going forward. The first of which will, probably, be another collection of short stories and another re-read: Sherlock Holmes in Orbit edited by Mike Resnick and Martin H Greenburg, but that won’t be for a few months at least.