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THE HOLMES– DRACULA FILE

Fred Saberhagen (1978)

This is a highly original Holmes novel, narrated equally by Watson, and the greatest of all supernatural villains, Count Dracula. Set in London in 1878, it is a suspense-filled tale featuring a mad scientist, plague-infested rats, and bloodless corpses that combines the worlds of both Conan Doyle and Bram Stoker. Unlike other Holmes/ Dracula encounters by different authors, here they work together, although a more surprising and controversial relationship is later revealed. Holmes also encounters Count Dracula in Sherlock Holmes vs Dracula: The Adventure of the Sanguinary Count by Loren D. Estelman (1979).

TEN YEARS BEYOND BAKER STREET

Cay Van Ash (1984)

In another pairing of literary worlds and fictional characters, this novel pits Conan Doyle’s Holmes against Sax Rohmer’s infamous villain of the Far East, Dr. Fu Manchu. Set in 1914, in a richly-described Wales, the plot is as much an action adventure as it is a crime story, which at one point sees Holmes and his client, Dr. Petrie, facing certain death in an abandoned mine. This book is well regarded by Holmes fans for the authenticity of Watson’s narration. It is also notable that, like Holmes in many of Conan Doyle’s original stories, Fu Manchu makes few appearances, with the plot focusing mainly on his pursuit. In 1971, Van Ash wrote Master of Villainy, a biography of Sax Rohmer.

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THE BEEKEEPER’S APPRENTICE

Laurie R. King (1994)

This is the first in a series of Holmes novels by King, in which she details the adventures of the aging detective, seen from the viewpoint of Mary Russell, a 15-year-old American girl living in Sussex following the death of her parents. In this first outing, Holmes is training his new apprentice in the art of deduction, and the two are soon investigating a sinister kidnapping. With its strong female lead character and villain, this book is noted for its feminist current. King outraged many Holmesians by marrying off the asexual detective to the feisty Russell in the second book in the series, A Monstrous Regiment of Women (1995). He was, of course, first married with Conan Doyle’s consent in Gillette’s 1899 play, Sherlock Holmes (p.336).

THE MANDALA OF SHERLOCK HOLMES

Jamyang Norbu (1999)

This novel follows Conan Doyle’s ascetic hero during his “Great Hiatus,” as he travels through India and Tibet in the guise of Norwegian explorer Sigerson. The premise is that the author, Norbu, discovered a long-lost account of Holmes’s time there, written by his then companion, a Bengali spy named Huree Chunder Mookerjee—a character from Rudyard Kipling’s Kim (1901). The plot centers on Holmes’s battle to protect the young thirteenth Dalai Lama from assassination by an evil master criminal, and the story becomes increasingly mystical.

THE PATIENT’S EYES: THE DARK BEGINNINGS OF SHERLOCK HOLMES

David Pirie (2001)

In the first in his series, Pirie features Conan Doyle himself as Watson to the Holmes of the remarkable doctor Joseph Bell (on whom Holmes was modeled). This account presents Bell and Conan Doyle as partners in a criminal investigation, tackling the hidden menace and sexual hypocrisy of Victorian life. The fictional Conan Doyle is intrigued by the symptoms displayed by a young woman with an unusual eye complaint; she is also haunted by visions of a phantom cyclist. The murder of a wealthy Spanish businessman monopolizes the two detectives’ attention, until the matter of the patient’s eyes and the solitary cyclist looms large.

THE FINAL SOLUTION

Michael Chabon (2004)

In this concise tale, the great detective is painfully aged, long- forgotten, and in seclusion at the time of World War II. Living in quiet retirement in the countryside, the elderly man in his late 80s (who is never named) is known only to the locals as a once-celebrated detective—his world is now one of sedate beekeeping rather than crime. He is visited by Linus Steinman, nine years old and mute, who has fled Nazi Germany with just one companion, an African gray parrot, who holds a puzzle. What is behind the baffling lists of German numbers the bird repeatedly utters? There is a deep melancholy infusing this story of the greatest of Victorian detectives, alienated and ignored by the world of the 1940s.

THE VEILED DETECTIVE

David Stuart Davies (2004)

Everything that was previously believed about Holmes and Watson is turned completely on its head in this inventive novel. Opening at the start of their friendship, Watson isn’t Watson, Mrs. Hudson is an actress, and both are employed by Moriarty to spy and report back on the young detective to prevent him from ever getting too close to the criminal mastermind. Even Mycroft isn’t what he seems. The plot cleverly weaves together Conan Doyle’s A Study in Scarlet and “The Final Problem,” reworking the earliest days of Holmes’s and Watson’s lives together, and culminating with an alternative take on that fateful day at the Reichenbach Falls.

DUST AND SHADOW: AN ACCOUNT OF THE RIPPER KILLINGS BY DR. JOHN H. WATSON

Lyndsay Faye (2009)

This novel is yet another bloody encounter with Jack the Ripper for Holmes, but very different from Michael Dibdin’s The Last Sherlock Holmes Story and the others. With assiduous historical detail, the world of early tabloid journalism (with Holmes himself a victim of character assassination), and fledgling clinical psychology are evoked in this relentless pursuit by Holmes of one of the world’s first serial killers. This novel is a highly regarded Holmes pastiche.

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THE HOUSE OF SILK

Anthony Horowitz (2011)

Unlike in many other pastiches where Holmes has been reinvented, here Horowitz has stuck closely to the original canon, and forged a loyal facsimile in Conan Doyle’s style. Set in Victorian London, the plot is twisting and, at times, dramatic. It contains many familiar Conan Doyle motifs: a rich client whose family is not all it seems; a gruesome knife murder; a detailed, violent backstory set in America involving brutal Irish expatriates; and some elaborate Holmesian deductions. Written for modern readers, it touches on many themes forbidden to Conan Doyle.

PROFESSOR MORIARTY: THE HOUND OF THE D’URBERVILLES

Kim Newman (2011)

This is an audacious take on the Holmes saga where seven of the original cases are retold, focusing on Moriarty’s and Moran’s previously unknown involvement. The tales are even retitled to reflect their new perspective: The Study in Scarlet becomes “A Volume in Vermilion,” while “The Greek Interpreter” becomes “The Greek Invertebrate.” Here, Moriarty and Moran are portrayed at their most cruel and villainous, and are seen at the heart of an international crime web, of which Holmes is not fully aware. Mirroring Moriarty’s role in Conan Doyle’s original canon, Holmes himself is barely referred to in the first stories, and only makes a full appearance in the final tale, “The Problem of the Final Adventure.”

THE BREATH OF GOD

Guy Adams (2011)

Set at the end of the 19th century, this novel has a strong sense of the paranormal. Someone is found crushed to death in London, yet despite being surrounded by snow, there are no footprints. It is up to Holmes and Watson to illuminate the mystery, and they travel to Scotland to meet the only person who may be able to help—the real-life sinister occultist and novelist Aleister Crowley. Narrated by the recently widowed Watson, Holmes is largely absent for much of the story, which instead features an interesting mix of real-life and fictional characters, such as the runic expert and demonologist Julian Carswell—borrowed from

M. R. James’s ghoulish short story, “Casting the Runes” (1911).

DEAD MAN’S LAND

Robert Ryan (2012)

Following an acrimonious disagreement with Holmes, this novel sees Watson working with the Royal Army Medical Corps in war-torn France during 1914. A series of deaths takes place, quite unlike the wholesale slaughter of the trenches, involving grotesque and mutilated bodies—the victims seemingly scared to death. Working by himself, Watson is obliged to investigate the mystery, and the flare-lit horrors of World War I become the stage for grisly nocturnal graveyard raids. Holmes features only in the shadows, often obliquely referred to as “the old man,” yet there is constant hope for a reconciliation between the two great former friends.

SHERLOCK HOLMES: GODS OF WAR

James Lovegrove (2014)

This is a tense and action-packed novel in which an aged Watson, visiting the now-retired Holmes at his cottage on the Sussex Downs, comes across the body of a man who has fallen from a great height. Is it murder or suicide? The dead man’s lover reveals that he had some Egyptian hieroglyphics tattooed on his body, and questions are raised over other recent deaths—is this the work of a clandestine society?

SHERLOCK HOLMES: THE SPIRIT BOX

George Mann (2014)

In this intriguing novel, Mann utilizes themes from his previous books featuring his supernatural protagonists, Newbury and Hobbes. It is set in 1915, amid scenes of destruction as World War I Zeppelins rain bombs onto London below. The aging Holmes and Watson are leading separate lives until reunited by Holmes’s brother, Mycroft. Rich and powerful members of society have been behaving erratically before taking their own lives in bizarre fashions. Mycroft knows something is afoot when a British member of Parliament gives a pro-German speech before jumping naked into the Thames River; a senior military adviser advocates surrendering to Germany before feeding himself to a tiger at London Zoo; and an eminent suffragette jumps to her death under a train having renounced the movement. Someone or something must be behind these events, and Holmes and Watson duly investigate.

CONAN DOYLE’S OTHER WORKS

S

ir Arthur Conan Doyle is undoubtedly best known for the Holmes canon, which is widely regarded as his defining work. Before creating the great detective, however, he had previously published a number of short, dark mysteries, including “The Captain of the Polestar” (1883) and “J. Habakuk Jephson’s Statement” (1884), a fictional account of the Mary Celeste, which were both inspired by his time as a ship’s doctor. Holmes brought Conan Doyle huge public acclaim, but he soon tired of his creation, wishing instead to concentrate on “better things.” He wrote many other works during the “Great Hiatus” and after The Case Book of Sherlock Holmes, including historical epics, fantasy adventures, and deep psychological pieces. Sadly for the author, none are as well remembered.

THE MYSTERY OF CLOOMBER

(1889)

Published a year after A Study in Scarlet, this is a Gothic mystery set in Scotland involving a family secret and long-awaited revenge. The appearance of the three mysterious Buddhist monks in a remote area has distinct echoes of Wilkie Collins’s The Moonstone (1868), one of Conan Doyle’s favorite novels as a youth.

MICAH CLARKE

(1889)

Conan Doyle’s first critical success as a novelist, this novel records the events of the Monmouth Rebellion of 1685 that sought to replace the Catholic King James with a Protestant rival. Events are seen through the eyes of Micah Clarke, a young boy who falls under the influence of a world-weary soldier of fortune. Becoming disillusioned with the religious extremism around him, Micah concludes that tolerance is vital for the good of us all. Micah may have expressed Conan Doyle’s own views as a disillusioned former Catholic.

THE WHITE COMPANY

(1891)

This historic novel was Conan Doyle’s first attempt to emulate Sir Walter Scott, who he admired. Set in England, France, and Spain, it follows the campaign of Edward, the Black Prince, to restore Peter of Castile to the throne in 1366–67. The hero, a knight, is Sir Nigel Loring, who Conan Doyle returns to in his later novel, Sir Nigel, in 1906.

THE REFUGEES

(1893)

Set during the reign of King Louis XIV of France (1638–1715), the central theme of this historic novel is the persecution of Protestant Huguenots through the revocation of their civil rights. Well-researched and richly detailed, it follows the tale of a Huguenot guardsman, Amory de Catinat, and his eventual emigration to America, where many Protestants settled.

THE PARASITE

(1894)

Written when his first wife was terminally ill, this is considered to be one of Conan Doyle’s most personally revealing tales, exploring the power of the mind and sexual obsession. Here, the repellent parasitic mesmerist, Miss Penclosa, controls the minds of the young Professor Gilroy and his fiancée, and is determined to destroy their relationship. Unsuccessful, it was later withdrawn by Conan Doyle.

THE STARK MUNRO LETTERS

(1895)

A departure in style for Conan Doyle, this is a thinly disguised biographical piece in which he drew on various incidents from his own life. It takes the form of twelve long letters written by J. Stark

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Munro, a recent medical graduate, to his friend Herbert Swanborough in the US. The letters detail his failed attempt to build a medical practice with the brilliant but unorthodox James Cullingworth, reflecting Conan Doyle’s early life.

THE EXPLOITS OF BRIGADIER GERARD

(1895)

Based on the real-life Baron de Marbot, Conan Doyle’s comic character, Brigadier Gerard, is a swaggering, vain officer in Napoleon’s army, yet is also brave, imaginative, and resourceful. He initially appeared in the pages of The Strand Magazine, with the first short stories published in book form in 1896. The Adventures of Gerard followed in 1903.

RODNEY STONE

(1896)

Set against a backdrop of bare-knuckle boxing at the time of the Prince Regent, this novel weaves together the coming-of-age of the narrator, Rodney Stone, and a murder mystery. Conan Doyle drew on the life of famous dandy Beau Brummell and many contemporary chronicles to capture the flavor of the period. He came to regard this novel as one of his successes.

THE TRAGEDY OF THE KOROSKO

(1898)

This novel tells the story of a group of European tourists who, while sailing up the Nile in a boat called the Korosko, are attacked and abducted by a marauding band of Dervish warriors. It is a clear defense of British Imperialism, and in particular, its reach into North Africa. It also reveals the very great suspicion of Islam felt by many Europeans at the time.

THE LOST WORLD

(1912)

This fantasy novel introduces another of Conan Doyle’s fascinating characters: Professor George Edward Challenger, an irascible, red-haired explorer, much given to losing his temper with anyone who disagrees with him. Like Holmes, Professor Challenger was based on a real person, here William Rutherford, a professor of physiology who had lectured at the University of Edinburgh while Conan Doyle studied medicine. The imaginative plot concerns Challenger’s expedition to a plateau in the Amazon basin, where dinosaurs still survive. Highly influential, it inspired many later works in which prehistoric monsters are loose in the modern world, including the 1993 movie Jurassic Park. Challenger returned in the novels The Poison Belt (1913) and The Land of Mist (1926).