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

The Mammoth Book of the New Chronicles of Sherlock Holmes (2016)

A collection of 12 new Homes stories by Denis O. Smith who previously published The Mammoth Book of the Lost Chronicles of Sherlock Holmes. A mouthful of a title, but a nice evocative cover.

“Is it really possible, do you suppose,” said Sherlock Holmes to me one morning, as we took breakfast together, “that a healthy and robust man may be so stricken with terror that he drops down dead?”

The much praised Denis O. Smith introduces twelve new Sherlockian stories in this collection, including “The Adventure of the XYZ Club,” “The Secret of Shoreswood Hall,” and “The Adventure of the Brown Box.” Set in the late nineteenth century before Holmes's disappearance at the Reichenbach Falls, these stories, written in the vein of the originals, recreate Arthur Conan Doyle’s world with deft fidelity, from manner of speech and character traits to plot unfoldings and the historical period. Whether in fogbound London or deep in the countryside, the world’s most beloved detective is brought vividly back to life in all his enigmatic, compelling glory, embarking on seemingly impenetrable mysteries with Dr. Watson by his side.

 For readers who can never get enough of Holmes, this satisfyingly hefty anthology builds on the old Conan Doyle to develop familiar characters in ways the originals could not. Both avid fans and a new generation of audiences are sure to be entertained with this continuation of the Sherlock Holmes legacy.

Title: The Mammoth Book of the New Chronicles of Sherlock Holmes
Author: Denis O. Smith
Year: 2016
Publisher: Skyhorse Publishing
Purchase: Amazon

The Return of Sherlock Holmes (1987)

I'm once again slipping in a canonical entry because I love this Penguin paperback from 1987 with the great Jeremy Brett on the cover. Still my favorite Holmes, even in this age of Cumberbatch.

SHERLOCK HOLMES RETURNS IN SEVEN SPINE-TINGLING TALES OF DETECTION

With the faithful Watson at his side, the inimitable Sherlock Holmes faces some mind-boggling puzzles–and manages to come out on top every time! Holmes's clever investigations in "The Six Napoleons," "The Musgrave Ritual," "The Empty House," and the other intriguing cases replete with treachery, duplicity, and murderous evil display the unique powers of his eagle eye and brilliant brain.

The Return of Sherlock Holmes is a dramatic series on Mystery!, a PBS television series presented by WGBH-TV, Boston, made possible by a grant from Mobil Corporation.

Title: The Return of Sherlock Holmes
Author: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Year: 1987
Publisher: Penguin
Purchase: Amazon

Sherlock Holmes and the Titanic Tragedy (1996)

Sherlock Holmes was on the Titanic? Apparently so. How did he survive? For that you'll have to read this 1996 pastiche by William Seil.

The world of Sherlock Holmes and the great Titanic are closely linked in this exciting Sherlock Holmes adventure by William Seil, a life-long devotee of the great detective. In 1912, Holmes and Watson board the Titanic en route to America, where Holmes is to carry out a top secret government mission.

Disguised as a Naval Commodore, Holmes is given the added task of looking after Christine Norton – a young and attractive secret agent – as she transports highly important submarine plans to the US navy. Soon after departure, tragedy strikes and the plans are stolen and concealed somewhere on board the huge luxury liner. The list of suspects is narrowed down to the most curious collection of passengers including the beautiful widow with an undisguised interest in Dr. Watson. Most notable of them all is Colonel James Moriarty, brother of the legendary late Professor Moriarty. 

As the investigation continues and the plot thickens the Titanic movies swiftly across the Atlantic towards New York. But out of the distance there is a place where the sky is dark and the water is bitterly cold. A gigantic iceberg waits, ready to take on and master mankind's latest challenge to the power of nature.

Title: Sherlock Holmes and the Titanic Tragedy: A Case to Remember

Author: William Seil

Year: 1996

Publisher: Breese Books

Purchase: Amazon

The Adventure of the Deadly Illusion (2013)

Holmes investigates a magical murder mystery with the help of Alice in Wonderland author Lewis Carroll.

Before 221b Baker Street, young Sherlock Holmes lodged in his rooms at Christ Church, Oxford. Before Dr. John H. Watson, Holmes was accompanied in his adventures by his college don, Rev. Charles Dodgson, aka Lewis Carroll (yes, Alice’s Lewis Carroll). And before the tin dispatch box with its trove of unpublished adventures, there was discovered, in an old leather document case, a most unusual manuscript, published now for the first time. 

Be prepared to enter the dark underworld of Victorian London - Seven Dials, Billingsgate, and the waterfront! A world peopled with murderers and magicians, royalty and rogues! 

A series of jewel thefts suddenly turns to murder. And Holmes and Dodgson are led from an old English manor through a magician's workshop beneath the mysterious Egyptian Hall to one of her majesty's most closely guarded secrets

"Sherlock Holmes and The Adventure of the Deadly Illusion" is Victorian mystery at its tastiest.

Title: The Adventure of the Deadly Illusion

Author: Ron Brackin

Year: 2013

Publisher: W&B Publishers

Purchase: Amazon

Sherlock Holmes, The Missing Years: Japan (2015)

The first book in a "seriocomic " series of Holmes adventures set during the great detective's "great hiatus."

It’s 1893. King Kamehameha III of Hawaii declares Sovereignty Restoration Day ... Tension grows between China and Japan over Korea ... The Bengal Famine worsens ... A brilliant scientist in Calcutta challenges the system … The senior priest at Kyoto’s Kinkaku-ji temple is found dead in mysterious circumstances.

Dr John H. Watson receives a strange letter from Yokohama. Then the quiet, distinguished Mr. Hashimoto is murdered inside a closed room on a voyage from Liverpool to Bombay. In the opium dens of Shanghai and in the back alleys of Tokyo, sinister men hatch evil plots. Professor Moriarty stalks the world, drawing up a map for worldwide dominion.

Only one man can outwit the diabolical Professor Moriarty. Only one man can save the world. Has Sherlock Holmes survived the Reichenbach Falls?

In a seriocomic novel that radically ups the ante, Sherlock Holmes and Watson find their match in more than one man (or indeed, woman) as a clock inexorably ticks. History, mystery, romance, conspiracies, knife-edge tension; a train in Russia, roadside crime in Alexandria, an upset stomach in Bombay, careening through Cambodia, nasty people in China, monks in Japan–here’s a thrilling global chase that will leave you breathless (occasionally with laughter) as the Sherlock Holmes: The Missing Years series begins.

Title: Sherlock Holmes, The Missing Years: Japan

Author: Vasudev Murthy

Year: 2015

Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press

Purchase: Amazon

The Revenge of Moriarty (1984)

This is a UK paperback edition of John Gardner's second Moriarty novel. First published in 1975, this Star paperback is from 1984. Star also reprinted Gardner's first book, The Return of Moriarty, in 1983.

In the foggy autumn of 1886 a sobre and strangely reserved gentleman arrived in Liverpool off the American steamer. Moriarty was back...

The world has rejoiced in the dramatic return of Sherlock Holmes from the Reichenbach Falls – but who would mourn Moriarty? Who, indeed, ever gave his presumed death a second thought? Until the discovery some years ago of three bulky leather-bound volumes...

Now, using the hitherto unknown journals of the Napoleon of Crime himself, John Gardner tells the unfinished tale of Moriarty. The evil genius returns from exile and, within the mysterious depths of the Victorian underworld, works to bring his treacherous allies to heel. Superintendent Crow's suspicions are raised – but perhaps too late. For he too has been marked down for an ingenious and subtle revenge – revenge that will place Moriarty at the pinnacle of criminal power... 

Title: The Revenge of Moriarty

Author: John Gardner

Year: 1984 (first published 1975)

Publisher: Star

Purchase: Amazon

Memories of Sherlock Holmes (1949)

This is canon, not a continuation, but this cover is wild enough to be a pastiche! This is a 1949 Bantam paperback edition of Conan Doyle's Memories of Sherlock Holmes. Below is a description of the cover from the inside flap.

About THE COVER

The Reichenback [sic] Falls! In a homely Alpine village, set down among lonely mountain pass, Sherlock Holmes at last met Moriarty, King of the Underworld.

There, in the spray that steamed up from the boiling pit below, where the swollen torrent crashed down on the cold black rocks, balanced in a battle over the edge of the giant abyss, Holmes and Moriarty held their last contest, a fight to the death for one–or both.

Title: Memories of Sherlock Holmes
Author: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Year: 1949
Publisher: Bantam Books
Purchase: Amazon

Locked Rooms (2006)

The adventures of Mary Russell and her husband Sherlock Holmes (!) continue in Laurie R. King's Locked Rooms. First published in hardcover in 2005. This Batman paperback is from 2006.

Mary Russell and her husband Sherlock Holmes are back in Laurie R. King’s highly acclaimed New York Times bestselling mystery series. And this time the first couple of detection pair up to unlock the buried memory of a shocking crime with the power to kill again–lost somewhere in Russell’s own past. 

After departing Bombay by ship, Mary Russell and her husband Sherlock Holmes are en route to the bustling modern city of San Francisco. There, Mary will settle some legal affairs surrounding the inheritance of her family’s old estate. But the closer they get to port, the more Mary finds herself prey to troubling dreams and irrational behavior–a point not lost on Holmes, much to Russell’s annoyance. 

In 1906, when Mary was six, San Francisco was devastated by an earthquake and a raging fire that reduced the city to rubble. For years, Mary has denied any memory of the catastrophe that for days turned the fabled streets into hell on earth. But Holmes suspects that some hidden trauma connected with the “unforgettable” catastrophe may be the real culprit responsible for Mary’s memory lapse. And no sooner do they begin to familiarize themselves with the particulars of the Russell estate than it becomes apparent that whatever unpleasantness Mary has forgotten, it hasn’t forgotten her. Why does her father’s will forbid access to the house except in the presence of immediate family? Why did someone break in, then take nothing of any value? And why is Russell herself targeted for assassination? 

The more questions they ask of Mary’s past, the more people from that past turn out to have died violent, unexplained deaths. Now, with the aid of a hard-boiled young detective and crime writer named Hammett, Russell and Holmes find themselves embroiled in a mystery that leads them through the winding streets of Chinatown to the unspoken secrets of a parent’s marriage and the tragic car “accident” that a fourteen-year-old Mary alone survived–an accident that may not have been an accident at all. What Russell is about to discover is that even a forgotten past never dies…and it can kill again. 

Title: Locked Rooms
Author: Laurie R. King
Year: 2006
Publisher: Bantam Books
Purchase: Amazon

Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street (1963)

U.S. paperback edition of William S. Baring-Gould's fictional biography of Sherlock Holmes. The U.S. hardcover was released in 1962.

"The greatest detective of all time"

"A fascinating piece of work...new and startling... Did you know, for example, that the notorious Jack the Ripper was identified and brought to justice? Well, he was; and by no less a personage than the master sleuth, Holmes. And who was Jack? You are in for a real surprise...

"And did you know that Irene Adler bore Holmes a son, who now lives in New York and is a great detective in his own right? Read and discover for yourselves..." –Best Sellers

Title: Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street

Author: William S. Baring-Gould

Year: 1963

Publisher: Popular Library

Purchase: Amazon.