Escaping Obscurity: The Travel Diary of Harry Houdini, 1897-1899

This one wasn't found inside the tin dispatch box. In fact, it's not even a Sherlock Holmes story. But it is about an acknowledged Sherlockian who became a friend (and then foe) to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and is known to have helped the great detective from time to time. This is my own first book about Harry Houdini!

HOUDINI BEGINS! 

Escaping Obscurity: The Travel Diary of Harry Houdini, 1897-1899, reproduces every page of Houdini's very first diary, kept when he was a struggling performer playing dime museums, medicine shows, circuses, and séance chambers. It's an incredible artifact that has never been made available to the public, and an inspiring story of perseverance. The diary is annotated by Houdini historian John Cox and illustrated with previously unseen material from the world's finest magic collections.

Will Houdini escape his obscurity? Read the story in his own words.

Title: Escaping Obscurity: The Travel Diary of Harry Houdini, 1897-1899
Author: John Cox
Year: 2025
Publisher: Mike Caveney's Magic Words
Purchase: Mike Caveney's Magic Words

Sherlock Holmes and the Houdini Birthright (1995)

Sherlock Holmes and Harry Houdini set out to save Sir Arthur Conan Doyle from fraudulent psychics.

Here's another Sherlock Holmes pastiche from the fertile pen of Val Andrew. Again two areas of mystery are linked: the exploits of Shelock Holmes and the secrets of master escapologist, Harry Houdini. Doctor Watson's collaborator, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, finds himself drawn into the world of fake psychics and Houdini is anxious for Holmes to unmask the perpertrators who prey on the innocent believers.

Once he has been torn away from his beekeeping activities, Holmes's investigations lead him to some surprising locations including a Ruritanian castle. Sherlockians, historians and magic buffs will all be intrigued and delighted with this classic detective story which links fact and a little fiction to suggest what may have happened to Houdini after death.

Again .... the game is afoot.

Title: Sherlock Holmes and the Houdini Birthright
Author: Val Andrews
Year: 1995
Publisher: Breese Books
Purchase: Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

The Grim Game (2024)

Sherlock Holmes investigates the death of Harry Houdini in this well-researched audio play by Scott McQuaid and Pop Up Theater. (The Grim Game was the title of a movie the real Houdini made in 1919.)

Click here for more Holmes and Houdini crossovers.

Five Miles Of Country (2024)

The third Holmes tale "as discovered by Gretchen Altabef." Lots of crossover fun in this one.

The year is 1896. Sherlock Holmes meets Thomas Edison. At the dawn of Cinema, a beautiful Broadway danseuse is murdered in Edison’s New Jersey Laboratory. Irene Adler encounters ghosts on Broadway. Harry Houdini mystifies the New York Vaudeville circuit. Holmes and Watson go hunting in New York City’s Badlands with Police Commissioner, Theodore Roosevelt. Meanwhile, Rachel Holmes journeys to the Pine Barrens to film the Jersey Devil and the denizens of Poughkeepsie reel in Kipsy the Hudson River Monster.

Title: Five Miles Of Country
Author: Gretchen Altabef
Year: 2024
Publisher: MX Publishing
Purchase: Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

These Scattered Houses (2019)

A Holmes tale "as discovered by Gretchen Altabef." The first in a trilogy.

A client forsworn, a threatened town, and a Goliath of unimaginable proportions . ....Sherlock Holmes has survived a three-year vendetta against him by Moriarty’s remaining henchmen. Wounded and bleeding, with Mycroft’s help he clandestinely boards an Atlantic steamship. At the close of his great hiatus, Holmes finds sanctuary at Vassar Women’s College.

This radical challenge entangles him in the web of a nefarious mystery. Its unraveling involves New York’s most revolutionary residents: Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony. To pluck his client from danger, he drafts the twenty-year-old Harry Houdini in outrageous sleight of hand. Four villains embroil the plot. The lives of everyday citizens inexorably rise to heroism.

And it all begins when a twelve-year-old girl matches wits with Sherlock Holmes on Market Street.

These Scattered Houses is a daring adventure in the style of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. As Professor Sigerson the pansophic gentleman of justice, Holmes is confronted by the evil that lurks within the smiling and beautiful countryside.

Title: These Scattered Houses
Author: Gretchen Altabef
Year: 2019
Publisher: MX Publishing
Purchase: Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

The Adventure of the Ectoplasmic Man (1985)

Paperback edition of Daniel Stahower's 1985 novel that teams Sherlock Holmes with Harry Houdini. Stashower would go on to pen a series of "Harry Houdini Mysteries" in the early 2000s. Cover art below is by Neil Stuart (design) and Doug Henry (illustration). You can see the hardcover HERE.

THE WORLDS GREATEST DETECTIVE AND THE KING OF MAGIC TEAM UP TO SOLVE "THE CRIME OF THE CENTURY"

When Harry Houdini is framed and jailed for espionage and Sherlock Holmes vows to clear his name, the two join forces to confound the crooks who are out to blackmail the Prince of Wales. It's a case that requires all their special skills––and then some. As Houdini reduces his body to ectoplasm, Holmes deduces how he does it. And when Houdini makes a daring exit from Scotland Yard, Watson becomes the only person ever to actually see him escape from a prison cell. The magical entertainment, glittering with suspense, comedy, and romance, is a must for Sherlock Holmes fans of lovers of adventure and mystery in grand style.

Title: The Adventure of the Ectoplasmic Man

Author: Daniel Stashower

Year: 1985

Publisher: Penguin

Purchase: Amazon.

The Pandora Plague (1984)

Most know that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Harry Houdini were friends in real-life. But Houdini has also has a regular partnership with Sherlock Holmes in the pages of fiction. The Pandora Plague by Lee A. Matthias was one of their early encounters.

Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson team up with the master magician Harry Houdini in another thrilling mystery in the life of the greatest detective of all time. 

Houdini is entrusted with a strange locked box from the Far East and is asked to open it. But even he has no way of getting into it until Holmes and Watson join him in solving the riddle of its lock. And when the box is opened, the three investigators unwittingly become entangled with THE PANDORA PLAGUE.

Title: The Pandora Plague
Author: Lee A. Matthias
Year: 1984 (first published 1981)
Publisher: Unicorn Star Press
Purchase: Amazon

Harry Houdini & Sherlock Holmes: Auf den Spuren Houdinis (1908/2020)

The very first pairing of Sherlock Holmes and magician Harry Houdini was in a German short story called "Auf den Spuren Houdinis" (On The Trail Of Houdini). This new book from Houdini collector Arthur Moses includes the original German text as well as a never before published English translation.

After a performance in Berlin, Germany, Houdini is kidnapped by his lesser rivals. Sherlock Holmes is urgently summoned to Berlin to investigate. Through his masterful deductive reasoning he tracks down the dangerous perpetrators in the nick of time. 

A recreation in its entirety of the German language pulp magazine series Aus den Geheimakten des Welt-Detektivs, featuring the 1908 issue number 101 "Auf den Spuren Houdini's" (On The Trail Of Houdini). Uniting Harry Houdini and Sherlock Holmes, formidable protagonists together, one being a fictional character and the other a living legend of history, is a masterful stroke synchronizing their uniquely charismatic identities. This text focuses on a single 1908 German language publication which brought them together, along with its never before published English translation in addition to later translated foreign language editions based upon the German work. Their two personas are as popular today as ever, with many modern pastiches, comic books and films successfully pairing Houdini and Holmes. 

Other reprints of this title in other foreign languages are represented by reproducing their covers; France, Belgium, Denmark, Mexico, Netherlands, Portugal, Romania, and Spain. 

Title: Harry Houdini & Sherlock Holmes Together Again In 1908: Auf Den Spuren Houdinis (On The Trail Of Houdini)
Author: Arthur Moses
Year: 2020
Publisher: Arthur Moses
Purchase: Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

The Pandora Plague (1981)

The Pandora Plague by Lee A. Matthias was first published as a mass market paperback from Leisure Books (below). Because of financial problems, the publisher only gave it a limited release. It later appeared as a trade paperback from Unicorn Press cut down by 8000 words. The author self-published a revised and expanded 3rd edition in 2009.

PUZZLING EVIDENCE 

The theft of a seemingly innocuous pocket watch, and the appearance of a small and mystifying heavy box, began Sherlock Holmes' most challenging case. In an attempt to open the box, Holmes requested the presence of master magician Harry Houdini. 

Soon, a series of puzzling events accelerated into a crisis of shocking importance, and Holmes, Houdini and Dr. Watson were drawn into the evil machinations of a hideously sinister plot. 

Holmes' abilities were pushed beyond their limits, and a startling discovery by Madame Curie told the great detective that the world's fate rested in his hands!

Title: The Pandora Plague
Author: Lee A. Matthias
Year: 1981
Publisher: Leisure Books
Purchase: Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

Sherlock Holmes and the King of Clubs (2014)

The third Holmes pastiche by Steve Hayes and David Whitehead teams the great detective with a familiar escape artist.

A BRAZEN DAYLIGHT ROBBERY... 

...at Christie's becomes the talk of London, but Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson are no longer in the business of solving crime. Holmes has retired to Sussex, to keep bees, and Watson, recently widowed, has returned to general practice. 

But when Watson, desperate for distraction, agrees to accompany his old friend to Vienna, to visit eminent neurologist, Sigmund Freud, it is not long before the pair are pulled back into the murky world of ruthless criminals bent on abduction, intimidation and murder. 

A shadowy terrorist group, The Black Hand, is plaguing the city, and when the tentacles of a crime committed in England reach across to Vienna to cil around Harry Houdini, the famous American escapologist, the Great Detective and his Boswell relish the chance of solving yet another puzzle.

Title: Sherlock Holmes and the King of Clubs
Author: Steve Hayes and David Whitehead
Year: 2014
Publisher: Robert Hale, Ltd.
Purchase: Amazon (U.S.) | Amazon (UK).

Sherlock Holmes vs. Harry Houdini (2015)

Dynamite Comics teams Holmes and Houdini in this graphic novel by Anthony Del Col and Conor McCreery with artwork by Carlos Furuzono.

When the world's most famous detective meets the world's most famous magician… death is the case! 

Escape artist Harry Houdini’s London tour comes under attack from a mysterious figure that controls the powers of spirits. The goal? To destroy Houdini’s career and kill anyone who gets in the way. Houdini reluctantly teams with sleuth Sherlock Holmes, who is locked in a fight of his own. Can the two rise above their own battles to overcome a seemingly impossible force? 

Written by Anthony Del Col and Conor McCreery, the Harvey Award-nominated creators of Kill Shakespeare, Sherlock Holmes vs Harry Houdini is a witty adventure full of magic, spirits, technology and deduction. 

It’s a mystery you won’t be able to escape.

Title: Sherlock Holmes vs. Harry Houdini
Author: Anthony Del Col & Conor McCreery
Year: 2015
Publisher: Dynamite Comics
Purchase: Amazon.

Holmes and Houdini (2017)

The latest Holmes-Houdini crossover is from Ron Fortier's Airship 27. Nice Peter Cushing inspired Holmes on the cover. Interestingly, Cushing also played Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in the 1976 television biopic The Great Houdinis.

 

Terror in Gaslight 

They call themselves the Far Edge Club, a mysterious cabal of rich, sadistic hedonists who live only to create pain and fear in others. Just one man has ever bested their perverted schemes, the world renowned magician and escape artist, Harry Houdini. London becomes the stage for their final confrontation. 

The Club has recruited an army of killers in their maddened goal to destroy Houdini. But they are unaware he is not without his own allies. Joining the fray at the American’s side is none other than the Great Detective of Baker Street, Sherlock Holmes, and his loyal companion, Dr. Watson. Together these exceptional heroes will battle an insidious evil and attempt to solve the mystery of the Ghost Mask of L’Inconnu. 

Writer I.A. Watson delivers an incredible adventure mystery that will keep readers up till the wee hours of the night. “Homes & Houdini” is New Pulp fiction at its finest.

Title: Holmes and Houdini
Author: I.A. Watson
Year: 2017
Publisher: Airship 27
Purchase: Amazon.com

The Pandora Plague (2009)

First published in 1981, this is a revised and expanded 2009 edition of The Pandora Plague by Lee A. Matthias.

London, 1902: The theft of an unusual pocket-watch brings famed magician, Harry Houdini, together with the world's foremost consulting detective, Sherlock Holmes. When it leads to the appearance of a mysterious locked strong-box, it becomes a case that rocks the British Empire to its core. 

When the magician is blackmailed in order to best the box's lock, Holmes and his ally, Dr. John Watson, expose a plot against the crown, itself. Only Holmes's immense intellect, combined with the "Official" resources of his equally brilliant brother, Mycroft Holmes, can penetrate the mystery in time. 

In the tradition of Nicholas Meyer's "The Seven-Per-Cent Solution," and "The West End Horror," author Lee A. Matthias recreates Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's magnificent style and characters in "The Pandora Plague," a rip roaring adventure full of magic, mystery, and murder.

Title: The Pandora Plague
Author: Lee A. Matthias
Year: 2009
Publisher: BookSurge
Purchase: Amazon

Who Done Houdini? (2015)

Who Done Houdini? by Raymond John finds Sherlock Holmes investigating the death of Harry Houdini and defending Sir Arthur Conan Doyle who is a suspect in his murder! (Click to read: The real story of Houdini & Doyle.)

Detroit Free Press reporter Timothy Wiggins learns of Harry Houdini’s death on Halloween 1926 with more than casual interest. He had been at the great magician’s final performance the night before. Wiggins had grown up as a sort of magician himself on the streets of London, stealing to survive. But then he met the real-life Sherlock Holmes, who made him his chief Bay Street Irregular. Now, years later, Holmes notifies Wiggins he is in the U.S. at the request of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who is being investigated as a possible murder suspect in Houdini’s death.  

 What follows is a mad dash to New York and Boston with a deranged Spiritualist medium on the tail of Holmes and his team of investigators: Wiggins, his feminist wife, and Rose Mackenburg, Houdini’s top investigator into phony Spiritualism, which was rampant at the time. In Boston, Sir Arthur introduces the team to Margie, the most highly regarded Spiritualist of the day. Her séance and the bizarre form of treasure hunt that follows leads to a stunning climax that will change everyone’s perception of Holmes’s character. 

Title: Who Done Houdini?
Author: Raymond John
Year: 2015
Publisher: North Star Press of St. Cloud
Purchase: Amazon

Sherlock Holmes and The Escape Artist (2014)

Sherlock Holmes, Mary Watson and Harry Houdini join forces in a spiritualist debunking adventure. Fred Thursfiled has penned several other Holmes pastiche novels including: Sherlock Holmes and the Mystery Writer, Sherlock Holmes and The Discarded Cigarette, and Sherlock Holmes and the Terrible Secret.

Do Spirits Return?  

Sherlock Holmes, Mary Watson and Harry Houdini say 'No' and  prove it.

Title: Sherlock Holmes and The Escape Artist

Author: Fred Thursfiled

Year: 2014

Publisher: MX Publishing

Purchase: Amazon.

Sherlock Holmes: The Crossovers Casebook (2012)

A collection of stories teaming Sherlock Holmes with popular figures from history and fiction.

Moonstone Books is proud to present this original anthology featuring never-before-seen tales of the world's first consulting detective, Mr Sherlock Holmes, as he teams up with other investigators and notables of his time! Holmes teams up with one of the most famous thieves of literature, Arsene Lupin! Lawrence of Arabi! Calamity Jane! Sexton Blake! Houdini! The Thinking Machine! Doc Savage's father, Colonel Savage! Featuring short stories from incredible authors including Barbara Hambly, Will Murray, Kevin Van Hook, Martin Powell, Matthew Baugh, Martin Gately, Don Roff, Win Scott Eckert, Chris Sequiera, and Joe Gentile, this collection showcases the secret sequel to the classic Holmes novel "The Sign of Four", as well as Sherlock and Conan Doyle's own "Lost World" Professor Challenger!

Title: Sherlock Holmes: The Crossovers Casebook
Author: Howard Hopkins (editor)
Year: 2012
Publisher: Moonstone
Purchase: Amazon.

Pulptime (1985)

Pulptime by P.H. Cannon has Holmes teaming up with H.P. Lovecraft and Harry Houdini to solve a mystery in 1925 New York. Includes illustrations by Steve Fabian.

In these pages, H.P. lovecraft lives again and Sherlock Holmes stalks New York of 1925, looking for a set of mysterious documents stolen by New York gangster Jan Martens. A visit with Harry Houdini, a seance with a beautiful medium, a trek through the New York sewer system––and what lay beyond––make a fascinating tale, as told through the words of young Weird Tales writer Frank Belknap Long, Jr., Lovecraft's best friend.

A Lovecraft scholar, Cannon has utilized his knowledge of the many volumes of Lovecraft's letters to reconstruct some of the events of his New York life and to simulate his actual conversations. (His friends have said that HPL spoke just as he wrote!)

As for what the documents are, and whether there were recovered––read on!

Title: Pulptime
Author: P.H. Cannon
Year: 1985
Publisher: Weirdbook Press
Purchase: Amazon.

The Adventure of the Ectoplasmic Man (1985)

One of several books that teams Sherlock Holmes with the world's greatest escapologist, Harry Houdini.

Sherlock Holmes and Harry Houdini? The World's greatest detective and the king of magic–together? 

Yes, together, astounding all England and confounding the crooks who would commit "the crime of the century." Here, for the first time, are the details of this legendary case. 

Even while London is applauding Houdini for such incredible feats as "Walking Through A Brick Wall" and "The Ancient Hindu Water Torture Cell Escape," his devoted wife, Bess, fears for his safety. A rival magician is plotting against him. When Houdini is framed for espionage and incarcerated, Holmes vows to clear his name. 

So begins one of Sherlock Holmes's most colorful adventures. You'll meet such exotic characters as the beautiful and mysterious Countess Valenka, who attempts to blackmail the Prince of Wales, and Mycroft Holmes, Sherlock's brother, whose bulk is matched only by his intellect (said to be even more formidable than Sherlock's). 

You'll see Houdini reduce his body to ectoplasm–and Holmes deduce how he did it. You'll witness Houdini perpetrate the most astonishing escape of his career–from Scotland Yard! And, best of all, you'll see Holmes in action: his celebrated deductive technique, his uncanny talent for confounding disguise, and his hitherto unrevealed skill of flying aeroplanes. 

The Adventure of the Ectoplasmic Man is a magical entertainment, glittering with suspense, comedy, and romance. It is a must for Sherlock Holmes fans, and for all lovers of adventure and mystery in a grand style.

Title: The Adventure of the Ectoplasmic Man

Author: Daniel Stashower

Year: 1985

Publisher: William Morrow & Co.

Purchase: Amazon.

A tin dispatch box with my name on it

I have no business starting a blog about Sherlock Holmes. My true passion is Harry Houdini, and I run a blog devoted to the escape king called WILD ABOUT HARRY. But I really love Holmes, and I was a minor Sherlockian even before I discovered the magic of Houdini. I'm not a scholar, but I do enjoy keeping up with the latest Holmesian happenings, and over the years I've collected a few gems, primarily pastiche paperbacks, that I would like to share here. I'm also starting this blog because my name really is Cox, John Cox, and I couldn't resist the name. So, like it or not, here is yet another Sherlock Holmes website: Cox & Company. I welcome you.

UPDATE: I've changed the name of this blog to The Battered Tin and have decided to focus on the pastiche adventures of Holmes and Watson -- "cases for which the world was not yet prepared." Hope you enjoy.