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Sherlock Holmes: A Detective's Life
The famous detective returns in a thrilling anthology of Sherlock short stories, all penned by masters of the genre, such as Peter Swanson, Cara Black, James Lovegrove and more.
A brand-new collection of twelve Sherlock Holmes short stories which spans Holmes's entire career, from the early days in Baker Street to retirement on the South Downs.
Penned by masters of the genre, these Sherlock stories feature a woman haunted by the ghost of a rival actress, Moriarty's son looking for revenge, Oscar Wilde's lost manuscript, a woman framing her husband for murder, Mycroft's encounter with Moriarty and Colonel Moran, and many more!
Featuring stories by:
Peter Swanson
Cara Black
James Lovegrove
Andrew Lane
Philip Purser-Hallard
David Stuart Davies
Eric Brown
Amy Thomas
Derrick Belanger
Cavan Scott
Stuart Douglas
David Marcum
A brand-new collection of twelve Sherlock Holmes short stories which spans Holmes's entire career, from the early days in Baker Street to retirement on the South Downs.
Penned by masters of the genre, these Sherlock stories feature a woman haunted by the ghost of a rival actress, Moriarty's son looking for revenge, Oscar Wilde's lost manuscript, a woman framing her husband for murder, Mycroft's encounter with Moriarty and Colonel Moran, and many more!
Featuring stories by:
Peter Swanson
Cara Black
James Lovegrove
Andrew Lane
Philip Purser-Hallard
David Stuart Davies
Eric Brown
Amy Thomas
Derrick Belanger
Cavan Scott
Stuart Douglas
David Marcum
368 pages, Paperback
Published September 6, 2022
24 people are currently reading
213 people want to read
About the author
Martin Rosenstock
12 books5 followersMartin Rosenstock studied modern literature at the University of California, Santa Barbara. After job hopping around the colder latitudes of the U.S., he decided to return to warmer climes and took a teaching position in Kuwait. When not brooding over plot twists, he spends too much time traveling.
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
October 22, 2022
When I was in middle school, I had an opportunity to spend two weeks on a local college campus doing something dubbed "College for Kids". I took three classes. One was on writing; one was a play and the third was (hopefully you knew where I was going) about the master detective himself: Sherlock Holmes. I had been a lifelong fan of the character and am always a sucker for anything featuring him. This collection of short stories spans the entire length of the Great Detective's life. Of course, reviewing a book of short stories is always hard. Did I love all of them? No. Was I entertained by them all? Yes, and that is the best result you can have from a collection of stories. I will be very interested to read more Sherlockian fiction from several of these authors and I will continue to grab as much as Titan Books wants to publish.
Special Thanks to Titan Books and Edelweiss Plus for a digital ARC.
Special Thanks to Titan Books and Edelweiss Plus for a digital ARC.
January 22, 2025
this wasn't a bad collection of stories but it did put me in a reading slump. an interesting concept, some good stories some not-so-good stories. 3 stars.
May 24, 2023
enjoyed this very much.
a collection of short stories that "span Holmes's entire career"; features twelve different authors. personal favorites include The Tragic Affair at Millennium Manor, the Elementary Problem, and Peril at Carroway House.
one story offers the theory that Moriarty survived the fall at Reichenbach just as Holmes did, only to die later in the ancient ruin of an Asian temple. another had Holmes which i've read done before but is always fun. the Cara Black story held promise, but dissolved into weird grammar and an unsatisfactory ending; overall, however, the collection was surprisingly nice.
a collection of short stories that "span Holmes's entire career"; features twelve different authors. personal favorites include The Tragic Affair at Millennium Manor, the Elementary Problem, and Peril at Carroway House.
one story offers the theory that Moriarty survived the fall at Reichenbach just as Holmes did, only to die later in the ancient ruin of an Asian temple. another had Holmes which i've read done before but is always fun. the Cara Black story held promise, but dissolved into weird grammar and an unsatisfactory ending; overall, however, the collection was surprisingly nice.
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September 23, 2023Obviously it was the Philip Purser-Hallard story which drew me to this, and if it wasn't the best thing or even the best Holmes he's ever done, still it made powerful use of the detective and Watson as men out of time in their latter years. And in general, the book reminded me how much Holmes comes after the peak, how readily we return to the early stories and setting as the only; we're less than halfway through this collection when the somewhat boldly titled The Last Baker Street Adventure begins, Holmes departing because "I am beginning to feel like a fossil in my own city." A note of warning to which some contributors could have paid more attention; the stories are occasionally a trifle stiff in introducing a contemporary reference, or else feel a little anachronistic - but then I remember being startled at 'settee' in the Conan Doyle originals, so the error there may be mine. Certainly some of the stories make valid use of elements which were at large at the time even if they couldn't be included in stories published then - lesbian spiritualists, say. But I still cavil at Watson getting a little too openly emotional about his dipso brother, then brought to a more sympathetic understanding by a case, in a manner which recalls sappy American procedurals rather than Jeremy Brett or Conan Doyle. Some stories have obvious (re)solutions from the off, not least The Tragic Affair At The Millennium Manor, for all its attempts at obscuring that with idiosyncratic window-dressing. And the case revolving around Wilde's sons felt a little awkward, both in the way it rooted around in the sorrows of real people, and because another, excellent Titan book saw Holmes interacting with Wilde's characters. Conan Doyle existing as Watson's editor is one thing, but for Wilde to have merely transcribed real people would have been an outrage against all his principles. Still, I think the story which left me with the most mixed feelings was Amy Hughes' An Encounter With Darkness. I'm always suspicious of any new Holmes which feels the need to bring in Moriarty, Mycroft or Moran - all, lest we forget, very rare features of the originals - and she goes three for three. But I forgive much for Mycroft's understanding of why Sherlock needs Watson - in short, as an emotional support animal.
September 22, 2022
One of the things that I really like about Sherlock Holmes stories is that they can work in almost any format. There have been short stories, novellas, novels, and stories that span multiple volumes and hundreds of pages. The character and his crime solving methods fit wonderfully into almost any style. And whilst it's great that there are so many books being published where the worlds most famous detective solves a case over hundreds of pages it can sometimes be nice to get back to the short stories. And Sherlock Holmes: A Detective's Life is a great new collection that has a huge variety on offer.
The book has twelve stories set across Holmes' life, and we go from him and Watson only recently having become friends, to them being longtime crime-fighting partners, to the final days of Holmes' life as he retires for his twilight years.
The first story in this collection is 'The Adventure of the Spiritualist Detective' by Stuart Douglas. This is set not long after Watson has moved in with Holmes, and the text makes it clear that whilst the two o them have worked together a few times before this, it's still at a point where Watson is trying to pin down the kind of person Holmes is. As such, when the two of them are called in to investigate a strange haunting presence in the home of a well connected spiritualist it strikes Watson as unusual when Holmes begins talking about ghosts and the afterlife as if he believes in them. It's especially unusual when Holmes declares the home to be haunted and flees the property.
I really enjoyed this as the first story, because it instantly made the reader feel like these stories could potentially do anything. Fans will know that whilst Arthur Conan Doyle believed in spiritualism, Holmes very much does not; so him ranting and raving about ghosts makes you instantly unsure what's happening here. The story does some fun things with expectations, and delivers a pretty solid start to the book.
'The Tragic Affair at the Millennium Manor' by David Marcum is a slightly spooky affair, where a young woman returns to England after some time in India and begins to believe that her missing fiance is stalking her in her remote home. There's talk about two brothers vying for her affection, a remote cottage, and something awful hiding in the trees that makes this a particularly stand out tale early on in the book. It feels like one of those classic stories where the detective duo head off to a remote estate to look into a case, and where nothing is how it first appears. It's a slightly gruesome tale, and one that I loved reading in bed in the dark thanks to some particularly chilling moments.
Amy Thomas' story 'An Encounter With Darkness' differs from the other stories in this set because it's one of a few that aren't written from the point of view of Doctor Watson, and is instead told by Mycroft Holmes, Sherlock's brother. In this story Mycroft brings Sherlock into a scheme that he's been working on for a while, using his younger brother to help him make steps into infiltrating the criminal underworld under the control of James Moriarty.
Moriarty is one of the most iconic villains in literature, and possibly the most famous character in the Sherlock Holmes mythos after Sherlock and Watson, as such, using him can sometimes be a daunting thing. You want to make sure that you get him right, and that you don't overuse him either. For those trying to write stories where it could fit in with the Conan Doyle tales, you also have to be careful not to mess with that lore. Thomas does an amazing job here by having Moriatry being this sinister background presence that haunts this story and looms over proceeding. It's a great tale that I found myself wishing could have gone on for longer.
'The Wild Man of Olmolungring' by Cavan Scott is another story that bucks the trend by having it told from a more unusual point of view; this time being from the diary of Sir Ernest Henning. Henning's tale follows his adventures in the Himalayas, where he and his team of explorers search for evidence of the Wild Man, the Yetti. Whilst on the mountain the group runs into a strange Scandinavian man alone up on the mountain in a snowstorm. When one of the expedition is attacked in the middle of the night the group begins to think that they might be close to finding their prize, but the newcomer believes otherwise.
This story stands out as one of the most unusual of the bunch, and doesn't follow many of the traditions of the typical Holmes story. It's in a completely different setting, has a new narrator, and doesn't seem to feature any of the characters that we know. However, there's a very definite Holmes story here underneath it all; and one that will probably surprise a lot of readers.
These stories aren't just set during the height of Holmes' career, however, as there are some that follow the consulting detective after his retirement, when he leaves London to make a home for himself in the countryside. 'The Adventure of the Third Cab' by James Lovegrove is the first of these stories, and sees Watson going to visit Holmes for one of his first times; but doing so with a strange set of instructions. Following Holmes' detailed list exactly, Watson ends up stranded in the middle of nowhere with more questions than he started with.
This is perhaps one of the more laid-back mysteries in the entire book, and it leads to a story that feels quite peaceful and calm more than anything else. It reflects the kind of life that Holmes has made for himself now, one where he can still get involved in a mystery or two, but ones that don't have lives hanging in the balance, or begin with a body being found. It has the feeling of a man who's retired but can't quite give up his old life, and works wonderfully for Holmes at this age.
The final story in the collection is 'Peril at Carroway House' by Eric Brown, and sees Watson going to visit a much older Holmes, one who is now living in a small apartment in Eastbourne. Holmes, who is in a wheelchair, has brought Watson in to help with a case that he feels is brewing on the horizon; and being proven correct as always, Holmes is soon approached by a young woman asking for his help. A young woman who is the daughter of Irene Adler.
This felt like a perfect story to end this collection on. It showed Holmes at his oldest, at a point in his life where he's left his crime solving ways behind, yet gets dragged back in because he's approached by someone with a strong connection to his past. However, this story is more complex than it first appears, and heads into some unexpected territory that whilst surprising, is extremely welcome.
Sherlock Holmes: A Detective's Life is a wonderful collection of short stories, all of which are enjoyable and entertaining, that show a variety of cases, a wonderful selection of mysteries, and Holmes at various points in his life. And no matter how these stories differ, how surprising and strange they are, how old or young Holmes is, each of them captures something about the character and the original tales that makes them so wonderfully popular and beloved.
The book has twelve stories set across Holmes' life, and we go from him and Watson only recently having become friends, to them being longtime crime-fighting partners, to the final days of Holmes' life as he retires for his twilight years.
The first story in this collection is 'The Adventure of the Spiritualist Detective' by Stuart Douglas. This is set not long after Watson has moved in with Holmes, and the text makes it clear that whilst the two o them have worked together a few times before this, it's still at a point where Watson is trying to pin down the kind of person Holmes is. As such, when the two of them are called in to investigate a strange haunting presence in the home of a well connected spiritualist it strikes Watson as unusual when Holmes begins talking about ghosts and the afterlife as if he believes in them. It's especially unusual when Holmes declares the home to be haunted and flees the property.
I really enjoyed this as the first story, because it instantly made the reader feel like these stories could potentially do anything. Fans will know that whilst Arthur Conan Doyle believed in spiritualism, Holmes very much does not; so him ranting and raving about ghosts makes you instantly unsure what's happening here. The story does some fun things with expectations, and delivers a pretty solid start to the book.
'The Tragic Affair at the Millennium Manor' by David Marcum is a slightly spooky affair, where a young woman returns to England after some time in India and begins to believe that her missing fiance is stalking her in her remote home. There's talk about two brothers vying for her affection, a remote cottage, and something awful hiding in the trees that makes this a particularly stand out tale early on in the book. It feels like one of those classic stories where the detective duo head off to a remote estate to look into a case, and where nothing is how it first appears. It's a slightly gruesome tale, and one that I loved reading in bed in the dark thanks to some particularly chilling moments.
Amy Thomas' story 'An Encounter With Darkness' differs from the other stories in this set because it's one of a few that aren't written from the point of view of Doctor Watson, and is instead told by Mycroft Holmes, Sherlock's brother. In this story Mycroft brings Sherlock into a scheme that he's been working on for a while, using his younger brother to help him make steps into infiltrating the criminal underworld under the control of James Moriarty.
Moriarty is one of the most iconic villains in literature, and possibly the most famous character in the Sherlock Holmes mythos after Sherlock and Watson, as such, using him can sometimes be a daunting thing. You want to make sure that you get him right, and that you don't overuse him either. For those trying to write stories where it could fit in with the Conan Doyle tales, you also have to be careful not to mess with that lore. Thomas does an amazing job here by having Moriatry being this sinister background presence that haunts this story and looms over proceeding. It's a great tale that I found myself wishing could have gone on for longer.
'The Wild Man of Olmolungring' by Cavan Scott is another story that bucks the trend by having it told from a more unusual point of view; this time being from the diary of Sir Ernest Henning. Henning's tale follows his adventures in the Himalayas, where he and his team of explorers search for evidence of the Wild Man, the Yetti. Whilst on the mountain the group runs into a strange Scandinavian man alone up on the mountain in a snowstorm. When one of the expedition is attacked in the middle of the night the group begins to think that they might be close to finding their prize, but the newcomer believes otherwise.
This story stands out as one of the most unusual of the bunch, and doesn't follow many of the traditions of the typical Holmes story. It's in a completely different setting, has a new narrator, and doesn't seem to feature any of the characters that we know. However, there's a very definite Holmes story here underneath it all; and one that will probably surprise a lot of readers.
These stories aren't just set during the height of Holmes' career, however, as there are some that follow the consulting detective after his retirement, when he leaves London to make a home for himself in the countryside. 'The Adventure of the Third Cab' by James Lovegrove is the first of these stories, and sees Watson going to visit Holmes for one of his first times; but doing so with a strange set of instructions. Following Holmes' detailed list exactly, Watson ends up stranded in the middle of nowhere with more questions than he started with.
This is perhaps one of the more laid-back mysteries in the entire book, and it leads to a story that feels quite peaceful and calm more than anything else. It reflects the kind of life that Holmes has made for himself now, one where he can still get involved in a mystery or two, but ones that don't have lives hanging in the balance, or begin with a body being found. It has the feeling of a man who's retired but can't quite give up his old life, and works wonderfully for Holmes at this age.
The final story in the collection is 'Peril at Carroway House' by Eric Brown, and sees Watson going to visit a much older Holmes, one who is now living in a small apartment in Eastbourne. Holmes, who is in a wheelchair, has brought Watson in to help with a case that he feels is brewing on the horizon; and being proven correct as always, Holmes is soon approached by a young woman asking for his help. A young woman who is the daughter of Irene Adler.
This felt like a perfect story to end this collection on. It showed Holmes at his oldest, at a point in his life where he's left his crime solving ways behind, yet gets dragged back in because he's approached by someone with a strong connection to his past. However, this story is more complex than it first appears, and heads into some unexpected territory that whilst surprising, is extremely welcome.
Sherlock Holmes: A Detective's Life is a wonderful collection of short stories, all of which are enjoyable and entertaining, that show a variety of cases, a wonderful selection of mysteries, and Holmes at various points in his life. And no matter how these stories differ, how surprising and strange they are, how old or young Holmes is, each of them captures something about the character and the original tales that makes them so wonderfully popular and beloved.
January 20, 2023
The book contained a lot, and I mean an awful amount of stories that are utterly rubbish. They make a mockery of Sherlock Holmes and presents 'problems' that only cause unintended laughter. Amongst the dozen stories, I found only the following to have some merit worthy of being remembered~
1. 'The Adventure of the Third Cab' by James Lovegorve;
2. 'The Zen Garden Murder' by Andrew Lane;
3. 'The Elementary Problem' by Philip Purser-Hallard.
The rest, I'm sorry to state, are drivel.
Can't recommend this one.
1. 'The Adventure of the Third Cab' by James Lovegorve;
2. 'The Zen Garden Murder' by Andrew Lane;
3. 'The Elementary Problem' by Philip Purser-Hallard.
The rest, I'm sorry to state, are drivel.
Can't recommend this one.
April 4, 2025
All the stories were enjoyable for me. The humor and mystery was perfectly mixed!
December 13, 2023
12 short SH tales from various authors, only 4 made the 1 star rating (passable), 3 made the 2 star rating (pretty good) and a further 2 made the really quite good 3 star rating. There were 3 really really good ones with 4 star ratings "An Encounter With Darkness", "The Last Baker Street Adventure" and "Peril at Carroway House" so well done to Amy Thomas, David Stuart Davies and Eric Brown for those 3 titles. More please.
December 28, 2022
Good selection of sherlock Holmes story written by modern authors. The stories work their way through Holmes life. Well written there are a couple which were not as good. But another reader would enjoy them. Well worth a read.
July 21, 2023
A collection of short stories about Sherlock Holmes. The stories are rather too short, and by necessity they are more "adventures" than "mysteries". Still, the quality is excellent.
March 28, 2024
A great collection of short stories! I loved seeing different authors take on Holmes and Watson in their later years.
April 5, 2024
My fav was the guy who levered his brother by the neck up a tree, such a good idea
January 13, 2025
There's quite an industry involved in producing new Sherlock Holmes stories, some excellent, others less-so. I was recently somewhat disappointed by a Holmesian Christmas novel, but reflecting that I've always preferred Doyle's short stories to his full length Holmes cases, I gave this collection of 12 stories a go, and was generally impressed. The approach is to primarily cover the early days and last days of the Holmes-Watson duo, effectively filling in gaps, which works well.
Inevitably with each story written by a different writer there is some variation in the skill with which they match 'Dr Watson's' writing style in the originals - some get it spot on, others feel a little out of place. This is more notable in the early-set stories, as by the end we've reached the 1920s and it wouldn't be surprising if Watson had adopted a slightly more modern approach to his storytelling. I was surprised how much consistency there felt to be between the stories, apart from one that seemed to suggest Watson had gone through more wives than a Hollywood star.
It's difficult to pick out any individual outstanding stories - they rather merge, but in a pleasant way. Perhaps the oddest is Cavan Scott's The Wild Man of Olmolungring which, set it Tibet, is a very strange mix of the Edwardian style 'adventure in the wild' story with a Holmes-related twist verging on Scooby Doo. There was one story, The Elementary Problem by Philip Purser-Hallard where I was able to work out the solution to the puzzle Holmes was facing from the title alone - I'm not sure if that's a good or bad thing, but made me feel suitably smug. All-in-all, we got indirect connections to well-known Holmes canon events and characters in a way that was comfortable, familiar and enjoyable.
Inevitably with each story written by a different writer there is some variation in the skill with which they match 'Dr Watson's' writing style in the originals - some get it spot on, others feel a little out of place. This is more notable in the early-set stories, as by the end we've reached the 1920s and it wouldn't be surprising if Watson had adopted a slightly more modern approach to his storytelling. I was surprised how much consistency there felt to be between the stories, apart from one that seemed to suggest Watson had gone through more wives than a Hollywood star.
It's difficult to pick out any individual outstanding stories - they rather merge, but in a pleasant way. Perhaps the oddest is Cavan Scott's The Wild Man of Olmolungring which, set it Tibet, is a very strange mix of the Edwardian style 'adventure in the wild' story with a Holmes-related twist verging on Scooby Doo. There was one story, The Elementary Problem by Philip Purser-Hallard where I was able to work out the solution to the puzzle Holmes was facing from the title alone - I'm not sure if that's a good or bad thing, but made me feel suitably smug. All-in-all, we got indirect connections to well-known Holmes canon events and characters in a way that was comfortable, familiar and enjoyable.
August 28, 2023
I'm a huge fan of Sherlock Holmes - both the original Arthur Conan Doyle canon and the numerous pastiches that have been written by other authors over the years. Therefore, I'm always on the lookout for collections of new stories or novels featuring the "world's first consulting detective." So when I saw this on the shelves of my local Barnes & Noble, I picked it up and looked forward to reading it.
This was actually the second collection of modern pastiches I've read that were edited by Martin Rosenstock for Titan Books. Unfortunately, it was as disappointing as the first ("Sherlock Holmes: The Sign of Seven" - a collection of seven novellas).
Specifically, I thought only one of the 12 stories was very good (Philip Purser-Hallard's "The Elementary Problem"). A few were okay, including David Stuart Davies' "The Last Baker St. Adventure" and James Lovegrove's "The Adventure of the Third Cab." But the remaining nine ranged from "meh" to truly awful - especially Andrew Lane's "The Zen Garden Murder," which seemed as if the author was up against an editorial deadline and simply ended the piece as expeditiously as possible.
Consequently, I couldn't give it more than two stars. And I won't be adding it to my "Reread Worthy" stack.
This was actually the second collection of modern pastiches I've read that were edited by Martin Rosenstock for Titan Books. Unfortunately, it was as disappointing as the first ("Sherlock Holmes: The Sign of Seven" - a collection of seven novellas).
Specifically, I thought only one of the 12 stories was very good (Philip Purser-Hallard's "The Elementary Problem"). A few were okay, including David Stuart Davies' "The Last Baker St. Adventure" and James Lovegrove's "The Adventure of the Third Cab." But the remaining nine ranged from "meh" to truly awful - especially Andrew Lane's "The Zen Garden Murder," which seemed as if the author was up against an editorial deadline and simply ended the piece as expeditiously as possible.
Consequently, I couldn't give it more than two stars. And I won't be adding it to my "Reread Worthy" stack.
September 11, 2022
A lot of short stories featuring Holmes and Watson in different moments of their life and career.
I thoroughly enjoyed them as the cases are always interesting and entertaining.
The authors did an excellent job in developing stories that do not contradict the canon.
The level is always high and it can be read one story at a time
Very entertaining, strongly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this ARC, all opinions are mine
I thoroughly enjoyed them as the cases are always interesting and entertaining.
The authors did an excellent job in developing stories that do not contradict the canon.
The level is always high and it can be read one story at a time
Very entertaining, strongly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this ARC, all opinions are mine
March 26, 2023
Probably more of a 3.5. Enjoyable yes. Outstanding not quite. But it is Holmes so what more do you need? :)
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