Happy 2026! Let’s kick butt for another year. Or at least, limp to the finish in 52 weeks. I really enjoy ‘meeting’ with my friends – and some strangers – here at Black Gate every Monday morning. Keep checking in, and let’s keep the discourse going on things we love. Or at least that catches our eye. Black Gate really is a family. My time writing here has almost been longer than my marriage was!

I continued to evade the Firewall at Black Gate (no, I do not earn a cent a word every time I mention ‘Black Gate.’ like some kind of blogging Pulpster), so I showed up every Monday morning. I had a much harder time conning other folks into writing my column for me – they’re catching on. Drat! So, I had to do my own work this past year.

Here are what I thought were ten of my better efforts in 2025. Hopefully you saw them back when I first posted them. But if not, maybe you’ll check out a few now. Ranking them seemed a bit egotistical, so they’re in chronological order. Let’s go!

1) The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes – Death of a Detective in Paradise (January 6, 2025)

I kicked off 2025 with an episode of just about my favorite ongoing series. Death in Paradise (I stream it through BritBox), ran its fourteenth season, reaching episode 117 of this British police procedural with some humor mixed in. SPOILERS!!! I talk about Episode 1 of Season 3. You should watch the show through that episode before you read my post. SUPER SPOILER!

There have been a lot of significant cast changes, and this latest season was no exception. I really enjoy these hour-long episodes, set on the tropical island of Saint (pronounced ‘San’) Marie. It’s a British protectorate with a French culture, which makes the almost-always socially awkward Scotland Yard Detective Inspector a fish out of water. There have been two spin-off series, adding to the fun. I’ve also read three spin-off novels written by the show’s creator. I recommend going to season one, which featured the terrific Ben Miller (Johnny English’s sidekick, and currently starring in Professor T) and checking it out.

They just dropped a terrific Christmas episode (also an inter-related one for Beyond Paradise). Looking forward to more episodes this year!

2) An Important Life – Howard Andrew Jones: 1968 – 2025 (January 20, 2025)

Howard Andrew Jones was a friend to innumerable people. I was fortunate enough to be one of them. Howard died of a fast-acting brain cancer on January 16 of last year. The world’s star dimmed that day. This was my tribute to my buddy. And I plan on running it every mid-January in memory of the best of us Black Gaters. He is terribly missed.

3) Guns or Butter: Total War – Warhammer II (February 24, 2025)

I thought this was a pretty neat concept. I’m a huge fan of the Total War: Warhammer games. I loved I and II. I gave a short trial of III, though it didn’t grab me. Maybe I’ll dive in sometime in the future. I did an overview of I/II, but I framed it with the enduring economic model of ‘guns or butter?’ – Which is a way of looking at how governments choose between domestic or defense (war) spending. I think this was a cool post.

4) Eleven Years of Monday Mornings with Bob (March 10, 2025)

I reflected on somehow having managed to hang around here at Black Gate for eleven years. Includes a link to Ya Gotta Ask, where I talk about my evolution as a writer and blogger.

5) Nero Wolfe’s Brownstone: 3 Good Reasons – Black Orchids (March 24, 2025)

I didn’t spend as much time on Nero Wolfe in 2025. My love of the gargantuan detective and The Corpus hasn’t diminished. Just a case of limited attention and time. I did do another 3 Good Reasons. That’s where I take one story and identify three reasons it’s the ‘best’ of them all. Along with one reason it may not be. This fun approach inspired what became Hither Came Conan. Except, I’m doing all the stories myself, for Wolfe. More to come.

6) 52 Weeks: 52 Sherlock Holmes Novels – Kurland’s The Infernal Device (May 19, 2025)

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes made an appearance. If you didn’t know, my first three years here, that was the title of my weekly column (when I mostly stayed in my lane and wrote about mysteries). Building on his previous collections covering Western movies/TV shows/novels, Paul Bishop gathered folks together to talk about 52 Sherlock Holmes pastiches (the number chosen to represent one a week).

Paul let me cover four different novels, and one of Michael Kurland’s Moriarty books was a no-brainer. Click on over and check out what I had to say: then maybe get the book.

7) A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Kirby O’Donnell and the Bloodstained God (June 30, 2025)

I have now covered all three Kirby O’Donnell stories, one of Robert E. Howard’s three ‘gunslingers in the Wild East.’ I suspect next year’s ‘Best of’ column will feature my essay on the lone story featuring Steve Clarney. Then maybe I’ll have the intestinal fortitude to write something on El Borak. Dave Hardy cast a VERY long shadow on that topic.

8) A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Hardboiled Gaming – L.A. Noire (July 14, 2025)

I played more Fortnite than any other game this year. I get the battle pass with my accumulated credits every chapter, and my anal retentiveness has me grinding to get the rewards. Elder Scrolls Online was another rabbit hole I jumped down. I love that MMO, but I caught myself and uninstalled it.

La Noire is by the folks who make Grand Theft Auto, and also Red Dead Redemption. As you can read in the post, I enjoyed this one. It was like being in a hardboiled movie from the forties. And that is right down my alley. I hit an annoying quest and got sidetracked, so I set this aside. I often don’t finish video games I play. And that’s fine with me – I enjoy my time in them. Often I start over and have some fun with them again. I want to start Red Dead Redemption II again, which is a pretty good game I sampled. NOTE – if you read last week’s post, you know I am full bore back into this one. I am on the fifth and final ‘desk’ (Arson) to complete.

9) A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Hammett & The Continental Op – Volume 3 (August 18, 2025)

I continue to write intros for Steeger Books Pulp reissues. I have done all three volumes (so far) for Dashiell Hammett’s Continental Op. Delving into the greatest hardboiled writer of them all (I don’t hold Chandler as high as most others, so there’s no doubt on this one for me) has been a treat. And I’m looking forward to Volume IV next year.

10) Cimmerian September – A Plethora of Pastiches in 2 Paragraphs Each (September 29, 2025)

I joined in on Cimmerian September, celebrating Robert E. Howard’s mighty-thewed barbarian. It was a month of Conan, and in this one, I looked at 20 pastiches over the decades. The hardest part wasn’t choosing which ones to cover: it was limiting myself to only two paragraphs each!

AND…..

I have some irregular columns which I write…well, irregularly. Here are the most recent iterations, with links to the prior posts over the years:

What I’ve Been Watching: October 2025 (October 20, 2025)

What I’ve Been Reading: November 2025 (December 1, 2025)

What I’ve Been Listening To (audiobooks): November 2025 (November 3, 2025)

Ten Things I Think I Think: May 2025 (May 26, 2025)

I’ve also got ‘Landing Pages,’ where I collect all my links on a favorite topic. I have such pages for Robert E. Howard, John D. MacDonald, Sherlock Holmes on Screen, video games, Douglas Adams, and Terry Pratchett, (those last two are Black Gate-wide).

I try to write positive stuff, and I inject as much humor (often self-deprecating) as I can. Since they haven’t gotten rid of me yet (actually, I just keep figuring out how to get around the firewall: poe-tay-toe, poe-tah-toe), I must be doing something right. I have definitely grown as a writer. Which shouldn’t be a surprise, averaging about a thousand words every Monday for over five hundred straight weeks (there are exceptions).

If you’ve been reading my stuff, you know I try and reply to pretty much every comment. I love discussing the stuff I write about. It’s a big reason I pick the topics I do. And even if we disagree, we can have a cool discussion. So please, leave a comment on my posts, if you’re so inclined. Both of us might even learn something new!

Hopefully you’ll find more interesting stuff to read on Monday mornings in 2026. I’ll do my best to keep bypassing the security, and post every week. And I definitely need to do another post or two from Black Gate World Headquarters. I think those are pretty darn funny!

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Bob Byrne’s ‘A (Black) Gat in the Hand’ made its Black Gate debut in 2018 and has returned every summer since.

His ‘The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes’ column ran every Monday morning at Black Gate from March, 2014 through March, 2017. And he irregularly posts on Rex Stout’s gargantuan detective in ‘Nero Wolfe’s Brownstone.’ He is a member of the Praed Street Irregulars, and founded www.SolarPons.com (the only website dedicated to the ‘Sherlock Holmes of Praed Street’).

He organized Black Gate’s award-nominated ‘Discovering Robert E. Howard’ series, as well as the award-winning ‘Hither Came Conan’ series. Which is now part of THE Definitive guide to Conan. He also organized 2023’s ‘Talking Tolkien.’

He has contributed stories to The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories — Parts III, IV, V, VI, XXI, and XXXIII.

He has written introductions for Steeger Books, and appeared in several magazines, including Black Mask, Sherlock Holmes Mystery Magazine, The Strand Magazine, and Sherlock Magazine.

You can definitely ‘experience the Bobness’ at Jason Waltz’s ’24? in 42′ podcast.