Tangled Web UK Review April 2008
Sherlock Holmes: The Games Afoot (Mystery & Supernatural) by
David Stuart Davies
pbk out March 08
(Wordsworth)
at £2.99
What the world needs now is love, sweet love, or so the song goes. Does it really need any more Sherlock Holmes pastiches? Nobody can out-do the originals by Conan Doyle and there have been countless attempts to follow in his footsteps, for over a century. Well, in my opinion, the answer to the question is yes. Even if Sir Arthur’s masterpieces are unsurpassable, there is pleasure to be gained from writing and reading Holmes pastiches, and I enjoy doing both. Here we have a collection edited by a leading Sherlockian, who is also a novelist and playwright. Davies is the author of ‘The Adventure of the Whitrow Inheritance’, which is the shortest story in the book, but it is a neatly wrought tale, and a good example of what can be done with such an enticing detective as Holmes, even when writing economically. The other contributors include eminent figures such as June Thomson (author of some of the finest Holmes pastiches ever written, as well as a biography of Holmes and Watson), and experienced Sherlockians like John Hall. But it is the presence in this book of stories by younger writers such as Rafe McGregor, Matthew Booth and M.J. Elliott, that is the best evidence of the timeless appeal of Sherlock. Each generation falls in love with him, and there is no sign that this will cease in the foreseeable future.
(
Martin Edwards
- author of the highly acclaimed Harry Devlin Mysteries)
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