Tag Archives: sherlock holmes

March 3, 2026 · 7:52 am

The Sign of Four – Arthur Conan Doyle

I have continued my Sherlock Holmes adventure with number two. Also read by Stephen Fry.

Here’s the blurb …

Sherlock Holmes is bored and case-less, and relieving his boredom by alternating morphine and cocaine. Enter the charming Miss Mary Morstan, with whom Watson is instantly smitten. She requests the assistance of Holmes and Watson to solve the mysterious disappearance of her father, and the subsequent invitation to ‘have justice’ by an anonymous letter writer.

Holmes and Watson happily accompany her to see the anonymous letter writer; only to become deeply embroiled in a mystery concerning treasure, murders, India, escaped convicts and small savages with poisoned blowpipes.

I enjoyed this – the interesting locations; India, and the Andaman Islands, there is treasure, a man with a wooden leg, an Indian uprising, and a murder in a locked room.

It had the same structure as number one – first half solving the crime and the second half from the criminal’s perspective. Is this the standard Sherlock Holmes’ structure?

Dr Watson meets Mary! What happens now? How can he continue to live with Sherlock?

I am having a bit of a pause while I listen to Bad Actors by Mick Herron (I always like a Slough House novel).

Wikipedia The Sign of the Four

A Study in Scarlet (#1 Sherlock Holmes)- Arthur Conan Doyle

I read the Anthony Horowitz’s The House of Silk, which is a Sherlock Holmes’ novel written by Horowitz with approval from the estate, and I enjoyed it so I thought I would tackle the real thing. I remember a friend telling me to read them years ago – sorry Jacq I am finally onto it!

This is the first in the series, here is the blurb …

Dr. John Watson, discharged from military service after suffering severe wounds, is at a loose end until a chance encounter leads him to take rooms with a remarkable young man. The arrogant, irascible Sherlock Holmes is a master chemist, a talented musician and an expert on all aspects of crime. And when Watson is drawn into the investigation of a bizarre murder in which Holmes is involved, he is unaware that it is the beginning of the most famous partnership in the history of criminal detection.

First, Stephen Fry is a fabulous narrator.

In this first novel we get most of the characteristics that Sherlock is known for – amazing detection skills, cocaine taker, musician, weird experiments (he was beating a corpse to see if bruises can happen after death) etc. This novel is written in two parts (and possibly they all are?). In the first part, we get to the point where we know the murderer and then in the second part we get his back story – in this case set amongst the mormans in Utah!

I love how they are written – a bit Dickensian, with gentlemen, street urchins, and young ladies who require protection.

Here’s the wikipedia entry.

The House of Silk – Anthony Horowitz

After Magpie Murders, I wanted to read more Anthony Horowitz. In particular, I wanted to read the next one in the Magpie series, but that wasn’t in our Audible library (and I am trying not to buy anymore books). However, I did find this one.

Here’s the blurb …

For the first time in its one-hundred-and-twenty-five-year history, the Arthur Conan Doyle Estate has authorized a new Sherlock Holmes novel.

Once again, The Game’s Afoot…London, 1890. 221B Baker St. A fine art dealer named Edmund Carstairs visits Sherlock Holmes and Dr John Watson to beg for their help. He is being menaced by a strange man in a flat cap – a wanted criminal who seems to have followed him all the way from America. In the days that follow, his home is robbed, his family is threatened. And then the first murder takes place.

Almost unwillingly, Holmes and Watson find themselves being drawn ever deeper into an international conspiracy connected to the teeming criminal underworld of Boston, the gaslit streets of London, opium dens and much, much more. And as they dig, they begin to hear the whispered phrase-the House of Silk-a mysterious entity that connects the highest levels of government to the deepest depths of criminality. Holmes begins to fear that he has uncovered a conspiracy that threatens to tear apart the very fabric of society.

The Arthur Conan Doyle Estate chose the celebrated, #1 New York Times bestselling author Anthony Horowitz to write The House of Silk because of his proven ability to tell a transfixing story and for his passion for all things Holmes. Destined to become an instant classic, The House of Silk brings Sherlock Holmes back with all the nuance, pacing, and almost superhuman powers of analysis and deduction that made him the world’s greatest detective, in a case depicting events too shocking, too monstrous to ever appear in print…until now.

I have never read any Sherlock Holmes, but I did love the series with Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman. I was picturing them while reading/listening to it.

I very much enjoyed this – if this is what the original Sherlock Holmes novels are like, I will have to read them. There was more than one crime, several mysteries, poor children, rich ladies, American outlaws, art and possibly poison.

A review.

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Filed under 5, Audio, Classic, Fiction, Historical Fiction, Recommended

Tagged as anthony horowitz, horowitz anthony, sherlock holmes, the house of silk