Search Results for: Sherlock Holmes

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Don’t Panic!

Comments 9 comments

To those who ascribe to Dirk Gently’s belief in the fundamental interconnectedness of everything (the working premise that made him the holistic detective that he was), you might be able to tie together today’s rambling post. If you do, feel free to explain it to me. My Sherlockian approach failed miserably in the attempt. I got to the point where, once I had eliminated the impossible, whatever remained, however improbable, must be the truth. Except what remained was still impossible….

Read More Read More

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Lt. Columbo

Comments 4 comments

The mystery field is full of great detectives and private eyes, both amateur and professional, created by authors. Hercule Poirot, Nero Wolfe, Father Brown, Inspector Morse, Sam Spade, Philip Marlowe, Mike Hammer, The Continental Op: and of course, Sherlock Holmes. The list goes on and on. There have also been quite a few detectives created for television. McCloud, Matt Houston, Magnum PI and Jim Rockford to name a few. The germaphobic Adrian Monk was immensely popular. But perhaps the supreme…

Read More Read More

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Stephen Mangan’s Dirk Gently

Comments 3 comments

Last week, I was writing my post for today. It was about the Houdini and Doyle miniseries, in which Stephen Mangan plays Arthur Conan Doyle, who was, of course, the creator of Sherlock Holmes. But, the principle of Zen Writing Navigation took me elsewhere. There is a school of thought that says you should use a map when you are lost. Dirk Gently’s strategy is to find someone who looks like they know where they are going and follow them….

Read More Read More

New Treasures: Who Killed Sherlock Holmes?, the Third Shadow Police Novel by Paul Cornell

Comments 2 comments

I bought a copy of Paul Cornell’s London Falling, the first novel in what was to become his Shadow Police series, shortly after it was released in 2013. It followed Detective Inspector James Quill and his team after they came into contact with a strange artifact and accidentally develop the Sight, enabling them to take on the otherworldly creatures secretly prowling London’s streets. I missed The Severed Streets, the second in the series, completely, so I was very grateful to receive a review…

Read More Read More

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Mysteries at Hallmark

Comments 6 comments

My wife and I enjoy watching murder mystery movies on Hallmark. More accurately, the Hallmark Movies and Mystery Channel (HMMC). Many of them had previously run on the Hallmark Channel that most folks are more familiar with. My previous cable provider didn’t provide HMMC at the tier I purchased, and many of my friends don’t have it either. It’s out there, but it’s not a low-tier feature in many systems. Which is a shame, because there’s a lot of viewing…

Read More Read More

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: The MX Anthologies – All the Holmes You Need

Comments 5 comments

David Marcum and I email each other. A lot! It is sort of a modern version of the HP Lovecraft – Robert E. Howard letter swapping. Without the gravitas. And the weirdness. And the literary importance. And the…oh, never mind. One Thursday afternoon in January of 2015, he sent me an email about a dream that he had had the previous night. The dream (and the email) was about putting together a multi-author anthology of traditional Sherlock Holmes stories. As…

Read More Read More

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Dr. Watson for Comic Relief?

Comments 3 comments

For many (especially of a certain age), the image of Doctor Watson is that of a buffoon who provides little assistance and lots of laughs. And the “credit” for that perception can be laid at the feet of Nigel Bruce. Bruce appeared in fourteen popular movies opposite Basil Rathbone’s beloved Holmes, and he also played the good doctor in well over two hundred radio plays – most with Rathbone. In the first two films, The Hound of the Baskervilles and…

Read More Read More

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: The Gloria Scott – The Real Story

Comments 2 comments

“The Adventure of the Gloria Scott” appeared in The Strand Magazine in April of 1893 and was included in The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes. In it, Holmes recounts a tale of his university days to Watson. It is one of two tales Doyle gives us before Holmes meets Watson – and the earliest of the pair. Take a few minutes and go read it. Then, come on back here to Black Gate. Below, I’ve got a very different account of that…

Read More Read More

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: The Key West Private Eye – Gideon Lowry

Comments 0 Comment

As I’ve posted here at Black Gate, John D. MacDonald, author of the Travis McGee series (and much, much more) is my favorite writer. And I believe, one of the greatest American writers of the twentieth century, in any genre. His is the pre-eminent name in the subcategory of ‘Florida writers.’ Randy Wayne White’s Doc Ford, a marine biologist who lives in a stilt house, is McGee’s successor. I think White is a top-notch writer and I certainly recommend that…

Read More Read More

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Austin’s Jack the Ripper

Comments 3 comments

This morning’s post would have been about Houdini and Doyle, the new TV series airing Monday nights on Fox. Except I missed the pilot: and contrary to much public opinion, I only write posts on subjects I know something about. Maybe not much, but… From what I can tell, it’s a buddy cop show in which the pair, one a believer in supernatural phenomena (Doyle), the other a skeptic (Houdini), investigates crimes. Brings to mind a poor man’s Mulder and…

Read More Read More