By Sir Arthur Conan Doyle The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor is an unusually snarky title for one of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes Stories – but more on that later. The tenth of twelve stories collected in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, the story is one of those that the great detective solves from…
The Adventure of the Engineer’s Thumb is perhaps the least Holmesian of Conan Doyle’s earlier stories, barely featuring any deduction from the great detective. Still set firmly within the Holmes canon it is, as the title hints, more adventure than mystery. It’s also more the engineer’s tale than either Holmes’ or Watson’s. We’re no worse…
by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle The Sherlock Holmes story I have read and enjoyed most of all, The Adventure of the Speckled Band is the finest of Conan Doyle’s mysteries. Taking a classic locked-room set up, the adventure adds a sense of urgency and horror only matched by perhaps by then novel-length The Hound of the Baskervilles in the Holmes…
In which Holmes can’t disguise his astounding abilities. The Man With The Twisted Lip is an unusual Holmes story. Rather than investigating a murder or robbery, this time there may not even have been a crime committed. The story begins when a Mrs St Clair engages Sherlock Holmes to find her husband, a wealthy city…
In which murder is perhaps less fruitful than imagined. The Five Orange Pips stands out in my mind for two reasons. Firstly, the title evokes such mystery and intrigue – though perhaps just by differing from the more common The Adventure of the Something Something format that we’ll see take hold in later stories. Secondly, the pips within…
In which we see that two become one. First published in 1891, A Case of Identity is the third story in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes collection from the following year. It’s notable for featuring seven of Sidney Paget’s wonderful illustrations, which seem to fill almost half the paper of this succinct narrative. A young lady arrives at…
In which Holmes uncovers the truth beneath a simple murder. The Boscombe Valley Mystery is the fourth short story collected within The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. First published in the Strand Magazine in 1891, it takes Holmes and Watson away from their familiar London streets out into the English countryside. Called to investigate by Lestrade, Holmes learns that…
In which Holmes and Watson meet a fiery pawnbroker whose luck has run out. The Red-Headed League was considered by Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle as the second-best of his Holmes stories when reflecting on his output in 1927. It’s hard to disagree with the author, as this adventure, in particular, has remained in my memory…
In which the woman and author change the game. Though we often think of Sherlock Holmes as a character of short stories, it wasn’t until his third outing that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle moved into the medium. The author would write a further 55 stories alongside 4 novels – beginning with A Study in Scarlet and The…
Once again, it’s time to delve into my complete Sherlock Holmes collection for another mystery with the world’s most famous detective. This time, it’s The Sign of Four, sometimes called The Sign of the Four but who really cares, there are four people and they make a sign. Unlike the more celebrated Holmes novels, A Study…