Sherlock's Sisters: The British Female Detective, 1864-1913 by
Joseph A. Kestner
hbk out March 04
Published by Ashgate Publishing
at £45
Long before Kinsey Millhone and V.I. Warshawski, crinoline-clad detectives were
blazing a trail for fictional female investigators. This academic but genuinely
interesting text, by the author of a book about Edwardian detective novels in similar
format, examines female sleuths through in-depth study of sample narratives in which
they appeared. Some of his selections are far from obvious, and the book is all the
better for that. Of the eighteen stories considered at length, Fergus Hume and Grant
Allen wrote two each. The remaining authors include Mrs Braddon, George R. Sims,
Baroness Orczy (better known as the creator of the Scarlet Pimpernel, but no mean
crime writer) and Richard Marsh, who wrote one classic, 'The Beetle', but is here
represented by an obscure book, 'Judith Lee, Some Pages from Her Life' (not the
snappiest title; perhaps this accounts for the obscurity?) Just occasionally, Kestner
slips into jargon, but on the whole this is a very readable and worthwhile volume
which provides a good deal of welcome information about little-known work of the
period.
(
Martin Edwards
- author of the highly acclaimed Harry Devlin Mysteries)
Sherlock's Sisters: The British Female Detective, 1864-1913 by
Joseph A. Kestner
