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Author: Bob Byrne

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: A Holmes Christmas Carol

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: A Holmes Christmas Carol

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A Holmes Christmas Carol – By Bob Byrne

christmastree_victorianIt is with a certain sense of misgiving that I relate the following tale, which took place during the Christmas season of 1902. I had moved out of our Baker Street lodgings earlier that year, having married only a few months before that most festive of holidays. I now had rooms in Queen Anne Street and was quite busy with my flourishing medical practice. A newly married man, I once again found myself as head of a household, with all of the duties thereof. I saw Holmes infrequently, but had found the time to visit him the day before Christmas. Certain that he would have no plans of any kind, I extended to him an invitation to join my wife and I for Christmas day.

Holmes rebuffed my attempts to have him share in the holiday spirit with us. “Watson, I have no use for the Christmas season. Is it rational to believe a man rose from the dead? And even if it were, do you not see the hypocrisy of it all? For one day, a man will give a beggar a farthing, because it is Christmas. He would pass by that beggar 364 other days and pay him no mind. That is Christmas?”

I could not recall Holmes being so churlish. When we had roomed together, he had not been an avid celebrator of Christmas, but he did accommodate my warm feelings towards the season. Now, left to his own devices, it seemed that his natural contrariness was shining through. I made one last effort to have him spend a pleasant dinner at the Watson household. It was to no avail.

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: The Field Bazaar

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: The Field Bazaar

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field_doyleIn December of 1893, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle rather unceremoniously tossed Sherlock Holmes off of a ledge at the Reichenbach Falls, stunning (and angering) the great detective’s legion of fans. Doyle, who famously said that Holmes “kept him from better things” (meaning, the more important, much less popular works that Doyle really wanted to write), insisted that he was done with Holmes and that was that.

Of course, from August 1901 through September of 1902, The Strand Magazine serialized the most famous of all the Holmes tales, The Hound of the Baskervilles. But Doyle let fans know that this was a tale from before Reichenbach and the great detective was still D-E-A-D dead.

However, the temptation of big and easy money was too much for the author to resist and he was lured into writing the short stories that made up The Return of Sherlock Holmes.

However, most casual fans do not know that Doyle actually gave Holmes a return appearance in 1896: yes, five years before Watson travelled to Dartmoor with Sir Henry. Read on…

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Cool and Lam are Back!!!!

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Cool and Lam are Back!!!!

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coollam_heatErle Stanley Gardner is best known as the creator of Perry Mason. Mason, of course, was the famous lawyer portrayed almost three hundred times (!!!) by Raymond Burr, spanning three decades of television. But Gardner was a prolific pulpster who wrote far, far more than just Mason stories.

For example, his Ed Jenkins was one of the early hard boiled detectives appearing in Black Mask. And under the name of A.A. Fair, he wrote twenty-nine thoroughly entertaining novels about the mismatched PIs, Bertha Cool and Donald Lam. And that’s who we’re going to talk about today. Make sure you read to the end for some very cool news (No, don’t just jump ahead to there, please!).

Cool and Lam appeared in twenty-nine novels over thirty-one years, with the final tale coming out the same month Gardner passed away.

Bertha Cool, profane, massive, belligerent and bulldog, sat back of her desk, her diamonds flashing in the morning sunlight as she moved her hand over a pile of papers….

Bertha Cool said, “Now, don’t make any mistakes about Donald. He’s a go getter. God knows he hasn’t any brawn, but he has brains. He’s a half-pint runt and a good beating raises hell with him, but he knows his way around.

Donald can find her if anyone can. He isn’t as young as he looks. He got to be a lawyer, and they kicked him out when he showed a client hot to commit a perfectly legal murder. Donald thought he as explaining a technicality in the law, but the Bar Association didn’t like it. They said it as unethical. They also said it wouldn’t work…

‘Donald came to work for me, and the first case he had, damned if he didn’t show ‘em there was a loophole in the murder law through which a man could drive a horse and buggy. Now they’re trying to amend the law. That’s Donald for you!”

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Modular: A Brand New Column! And About T1 – The Village of Hommlet

Modular: A Brand New Column! And About T1 – The Village of Hommlet

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hommlet_moduleYou might have noticed the name ‘Modular’ being tagged onto the front of some gaming-related posts over the past several months. Well, being the savvy folks we are we here at Black Gate, we know that Role Playing Games (RPGs), whether tabletop or electronic (Pc/video game/MMO) are immensely popular. And we periodically post about RPGs, in addition to other types of games: such as this one I did on the Dungeons and Dragons Board Game line. And because we’re an on-the-ball kind of website, we’ve noticed that those posts do pretty well.

So, beginning in January, we’re kicking off a regular gaming column called…. you guessed it, ‘Modular.’ The primary focus will be on Role Playing Games, but we want to write about all kinds of fun games and gaming-related topics such as movies, television shows, books, etc. Posts will be written by various Black Gate contributors, and we’re also going to invite some industry folks to come visit, like we did with our popular ‘Discovering Robert E. Howard’ series.

I’m really excited about ‘Modular,’ as I think we’re going to be presenting you with some great stuff – both contemporary and nostalgic. From pen and paper Kickstarters to Dungeons and Dragons history. To give you a taste of what’s coming, the following was intended to be one of the first posts in the series next year. It’s a look at just about my favorite module, T1 – The Village of Hommlet. And as I mention at the end, there’s going to be a follow up post with my thoughts on why The Temple of Elemental Evil was delayed for several years.  If you’ve got a topic you’d like us to cover, or even something you’d like to write a post about, email me at upabob@yahoo.com. The latter is how I ended up with my own column, ‘The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes,’ here at Black Gate. So….

The golden era of my RPG life is Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (AD&D).  To prepare for this post, I sat down and read my favorite AD&D module. Now, there are quite a few which I’m still fond of and would like to play again. But T1 – The Village of Hommlet is the leader of the pack. Surprisingly, I’m not particularly crazy about T1-4, The Temple of Elemental Evil (ToEE), the much-delayed sequel, which is usually listed near the top of every “All-Time Greats” list. For me, Hommlet is a completely self-contained adventure in and of itself.

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Get Hard Cased (with Charles Ardai)

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Get Hard Cased (with Charles Ardai)

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ardai_fiftyCharles Ardai co-founded the internet company, Juno. That success gave him the opportunity to start his own publishing imprint, Hard Case Crime, which both reprints forgotten pulp novels and also publishes new novels in the genre. The roster of Hard Case Crime authors is beyond impressive: Lawrence Block, Max Allen Collins, Lester Dent, Erle Stanley Gardner, Stephen King, Wade Miller. Richard Stark, Donald Westlake and many more.

Hard Case Crime has found several “lost” books by some big names, including James M. Cain and Gore Vidal. While Erle Stanley Gardner is best known for Perry Mason, he put out 29 books about a mismatched duo of detectives, Bertha Cool and Donald Lam. The Knife Slipped was to have been the second in the series but it was cancelled by the publisher. A week from Tuesday, on December 6, a veritable treasure goes on sale. Hard Case Crime is printing, for the first time ever, that unpublished Cool and Lam novel. I’ll be writing ab out Cool and Lam right here, next week. But today, I’ve got a Q & A with Charles Ardai!

A never before published Cool and Lam novel. Wow! How in the world did you get your publisher hands on that?

Jeffrey Marks, a biographer in the mystery field who has written about Craig Rice and Anthony Boucher among others, was working on a bio of Erle Stanley Gardner when he came across references to an unpublished Cool and Lam novel among Gardner’s papers. He brought it to my attention, and my reaction was roughly the same as yours: Wow. With the assistance of Gardner’s grandson we got a copy of the typescript from the University of Texas, where Gardner’s papers are held, and I read the thing, hoping against hope that it hadn’t remained unpublished for 75 years for good reasons. And far from deserving to be unpublished, I found it was easily one of the most enjoyable books in the series!

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: The Scarlet Claw

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: The Scarlet Claw

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rathbone_clawposterWe’re back with more Basil Rathbone again this week. Of course, you read last week’s essay about Sherlock Holmes & the Secret Weapon. This week, it’s a look at The Scarlet Claw, which seems to be considered the best of the Universal films (though it’s not my favorite).

First, let me mention the restorations done for the Rathbone films. The UCLA Film and Television Archive has restored over 700 movies and television shows, including all 14 of the Rathbone/Bruce films. I had bad VHS copies of this series and UCLA did a phenomenal job in restoring them. They are a treat to watch.

They also include commentary tracks – some by Holmes author and expert (and my former editor) David Stuart Davies. These DVDs have become more affordable over the years and I highly recommend purchasing these over cheaper, much lower quality discs. Trust me. I used to run the HolmesOnScreen.com website, you know!

Moving on: We can divide Basil Rathbone’s movie career as Holmes into three phases. The first encompasses the two films from Twentieth Century Fox: The Hound of the Baskervilles and The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. Both of these were set in Victorian England and Rathbone dons the deerstalker and Inverness cape.

Next are the first three Universal films. In Sherlock Holmes & the Voice of Terror, SH & the Secret Weapon and SH in Washington, the great detective is aiding the war effort. These three are more patriotic spy flicks than typical Holmes fare.

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Basil Rathbone & The Secret Weapon

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Basil Rathbone & The Secret Weapon

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secret_posterIt’s reported that in early 1939, movie mogul Daryl Zanuck was at a party when a friend suggested that someone should make movies out of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s classic detective stories. Zanuck liked the idea, but wondered aloud who should play Holmes. The friend, writer Gene Markey, replied “Basil Rathbone” without hesitation. He then added that Nigel Bruce would make a perfect Watson.

Shortly thereafter, the duo began filming The Hound of the Baskervilles, followed quickly by The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. Rathbone’s Hound is still considered the standard, nearly seventy years later. Both, released in 1939, were set in Victorian London, as opposed to the popular Arthur Wontner films of the thirties, which were Edwardian in design.

Surprisingly, Fox decided to pull the plug on the series. Rathbone kept his magnifying glass handy, however, as he and Nigel Bruce were starring as Holmes and Watson in a very popular radio series.

The first three Holmes films at Fox were Word War II thrillers. This isn’t a huge surprise, as the planet was aflame. While the two Fox movies could be seen as reassuring, British escapist fare, a money-focused studio could also look at them as quaint and irrelevant. Holmes fighting evil and bucking up nations entrenched in the good fight made commercial and patriotic sense.

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: ‘Dirk Gently’ is Not ‘Timeless’

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: ‘Dirk Gently’ is Not ‘Timeless’

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gently_circleI love Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, the novel by Douglas Adams. Which you know because you read my Black Gate post about it. And I liked the sequel, The Long Dark Tea Time of the Soul. And there were some good bits in the third novel, unfinished at Adams’ death.

And, I thought that the BBC miniseries starring Houdini & Doyle’s Stephen Magnon was worth watching. I own audio books of Adams reading Dirk Gently and the excellent BBC radio play of it. So, I’m a fan. I was leery after seeing the trailer for the new BBC miniseries starring Elijah Wood (not as Gently, however). It didn’t look like it was very true to the style of Adams’ books.

I’ve watched the first two episodes. Except for discussing BBC’s Sherlock post-season two, I’m usually pretty positive with my Black Gate posts here. If you are looking for more of that sunshine, skip the following and scroll on down to my review of the new show, Timeless.

With six of eight episodes yet to air, the new Dirk Gently is a festering pile of tripe. It bears almost no resemblance to Adams’ character, and even disregarding that, it’s a ridiculous mess of a show in its own right. Max Landis, who it appears wanted to imitate Quentin Tarentino while showing everyone how talented he is, all but completely ignores Adams’ work.

There is barely a shadow of the actual Dirk Gently in this series. Samuel Barnett’s character is totally clueless, almost completely helpless and neither clever nor funny. He just rolls along with no real insights or ability to influence events. That sound like Adams’ character? And, he’s not even the star, as the show is really about Gently’s reluctant assistant, Todd, played by Wood.

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Modular: Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerors of Hyperborea — 2nd Edition!

Modular: Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerors of Hyperborea — 2nd Edition!

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astonishing-swordsmen-and-sorcerers-of-hyperborea-smallBack in December of 2012, Black Gate head honcho John O’Neill wrote a glowing post about Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerors of Hyperborea (for ease of typing, we’ll go with AS&SH from here on in). AS&SH was created by Jeffrey Talanian, who co-authored Castle Zagyg with Gary Gygax (The Zagyg saga is worthy of a post in itself).

AS&SH came out of Original Dungeons & Dragons (0E), created by Gygax and Dave Arneson. That is the version that my retroclone of choice, Swords & Wizardry, is based on. Talanian cited Robert E. Howard, Clark Ashton Smith and H.P. Lovecraft as his influences. So, we’re talking Pulp: weird pulp!

Fast forward to 2016 and Talanian has launched an already successful Kickstarter for a 2nd Edition of Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerors of Hyperboria. As I type this, with 22 days remaining, it is at 318% funding and is tearing through stretch goals like the Cimmerians at Venarium.

The book will be somewhere around five hundred pages and will include a 32” x “40 color map, as well as an introductory adventure. Ian Baggley’s popular art from the 1st Edition will be supplemented with illustrations from about a dozen new artists. If you like this style of art, AS&SH is absolutely worth backing. Check out the new cover!

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Holmes for Halloween

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Holmes for Halloween

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halloween_arcanumI don’t really do horror. Now, I am a huge Robert R. McCammon fan and of F. Paul Wilson’s Repairman Jack. Of course, I’ve read a fair amount of H.P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu stuff (man, that creeps me out). And bits here and there from Robert E. Howard, Les Daniels, Anne Rice and a few others. But overall, I don’t really enjoy the genre, so it’s not an area I have a lot of experience with.

However, I have come across several examples of Holmes in the genre. And it being Halloween, let’s take a quick look at few titles that involve horror or the supernatural. Those two things aren’t always the same, you know.

The Unopened Casebook of Sherlock Holmes (John Taylor) There was a time when Holmes pastiches were relatively uncommon and, pre-Amazon, you grabbed what you could when you saw them on the shelves. I still remember being excited to buy books from Richard Boyer, L.B. Greenwood and Frank Thomas. Another was a short story collection by John Sherwood, a writer for the BBC. “The Wandering Corpse,” “The Battersea Worm,” “The Paddington Witch,” “The Phantom Organ,” “The Devil’s Tunnel” and “The Horror of Hanging Wood” are all supernatural-tinged stories. The last one remains a favorite of mine and something I wish I’d thought up.  Taylor wrote four more Holmes adventures, which were read aloud by Benedict Cumberbatch. I’ve not heard them, but every couple of years, around this time, I read a few stories from his book.

Gaslight Anthologies (edited by J.R. Campbell & Charles Prepolec) In 2008, Canadians Campbell and Prepolec put out Gaslight Grimoire, a collection of eleven creepy Holmes tales. It was followed by thirteen more in Gaslight Grotesque, and finished up with another dozen in Gaslight Arcanum. That’s 36 stories of horror and weirdness. You can certainly tell what you’re getting from the covers of the last two books. If you’re a Holmes fan and really like the horror genre, these three anthologies are just what you’re looking for.

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