This is the annual Sherlock
Holmes special, which appears every October.
We begin with Michael Mallory’s
tale ‘The Inimitable Affair’ which cleverly has Holmes and Watson dealing with blackmail, an ex-actress
called Ellen Ternan and a certain Charles Dickens. Enjoyable, indeed.
Next is ‘The Very First
Detective: The Killing Stone’ by Nik Morton, which is a pastiche concerning one
prehistoric Olmes and his narrator, Otsun, based on ‘a series of controversial
prehistoric paintings on stone tablets recently discovered in a secret cave
complex in the Pyrenees’. A great appropriate cover by Peter Habjan.
A non-fiction piece by Bruce
Harris interestingly analyses an incident in A Study in Scarlet.
A non-Holmes tale is ‘The
Secrets of Skin’ by Thomas K Carpenter, set in ancient Rome, where the obese magistrate
Ovid is placed in the unenviable position involving politics and theft. Some
excellent humour in this story!
Tim McDaniel’s ‘A Death in
Tadcaster’ is homage to Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple, concerning one Miss
Dalyrimple, with a neat twist.
The prolific Holmsian S
Subramnian’s contribution, ‘The Beginning of the Final Problem’ is just that, a
precursor to the Holmes story ‘The Final Problem’, and it’s well done.
Lastly, Peter DiChellis
provides a ‘you solve it’ short piece, ‘Treasure Cave’ – you’ll get the
solution next issue, however.
Available on Amazon.
