Amy Thomas's Blog, page 11

Milverton!

Stop! Pause! Before you continue reading, be aware that this post contains a spoiler for BBC Sherlock Series 3. It’s a spoiler that was tweeted publicly and disseminated widely on the Internet, so most likely one you’ve already seen if you follow Sherlock news.

A few days ago, the marvelous Sue Vertue tweeted one of the bigger pieces of news to be revealed about Sherlock’s upcoming return: A main antagonist of series 3 will be none other than Charles Augustus Magnussen, undoubtedly the updated version of Charles Augustus Milverton, who has a story named after him in The Return of Sherlock Holmes.

Magnussen will be played by Lars Mikkelsen, whose brother Mads is currently starring as the titular character in Bryan Fuller’s Hannibal on NBC. I’m personally unfamiliar with Lars’s work, but I know that he’s extremely well regarded in his home country of Denmark and elsewhere. I have high hopes that he will deliver brilliantly, the way Andrew Scott, Lara Pulver, and others have done on Sherlock.

But who is Charles Augustus Milverton, and why is this announcement generating so much attention? To understand, you first need to give up the few minutes it takes to read “The Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton.” Arguably one of the best Holmes stories of all time, it does what several other Doyle stories do — provides a perpetrator who is far more compelling than any of his victims. A sort of proto-Perez Hilton combined with Oscar Wilde’s Mrs. Cheveley, Milverton is a man who specializes in knowing unsavory truths about people and using those truths to extort money, or, if that fails, to ruin their lives. He’s the ultimate blackmailer.

I won’t reveal the end of the story here, even though it’s been in existence for over a hundred years, but it’s one of the most exciting, controversial, and satisfying in the original canon. Many Holmes stories contain action, intrigue, and entertaining denouements, but “Milverton” stands somewhat alone in its ability to engender psychological revulsion for its antagonist and an overwhelming desire for justice (through Sherlock Holmes) to prevail. (In my opinion, for what it’s worth, this story is far better than “The Final Problem,” and Milverton an even better adversary for Holmes than Moriarty.)

“Milverton” also features the one and only canonical instance of Sherlock Holmes becoming engaged to be married. Want to know how that happens? I guess you’ll have to read it…

I’m certainly curious to find out how Magnussen will compare and contrast to his origin. Many characters and situations in the canon have required creative updating to be currently relevant (Irene Adler, the Baker Street Irregulars, the Hound); however, to use current vernacular, Milverton seems like almost a no-brainer. In an age of Internet leaks, blackmail is as alive and well as ever before, and it’s not even a stretch to imagine a person living the high life by misusing the secrets of others.

It won’t be long until we find out exactly what Benedict Cumberbatch’s Sherlock Holmes and Martin Freeman’s John Watson have to contend with in the character of Charles Augustus Magnussen. Until then, it’s worth looking up Charles Augustus Howell, the real-life inspiration for Milverton, who was an art dealer and master blackmailer.

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The Detective, The Woman and The Winking Tree: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

The Detective and the Woman: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

 

Book Review: Benedict Cumberbatch, In Transition

Benedict Cumberbatch, In Transition: An Unauthorised Performance Biography

By Lynnette Porter

Reviewed by Amy Thomas

When I was a young teenager, I was utterly besotted with Prince William. What can I say? While my friends were eagerly snapping up magazines featuring N’Sync and the Backstreet Boys, I bought a short and fairly abysmal unauthorised biography of the royal heir. I didn’t care; it was something. Thankfully, Benedict Cumberbatch fans of any age no longer have to face the indignity of wasting money on shoddy prose.

Benedict Cumberbatch, In Transition is an exhaustively-annotated and impressively-detailed account of a young actor’s career. Some might ask if now is the time for such a book, releasing arguably nearer the beginning of his acting career than the end; however, the transitional aspect gives the tome much of its interest. Porter purposefully sought to chronicle the rise of an actor who is only just beginning to reach the heights many expect him to continue to scale.

It’s important to note that since the book is unauthorised, the information is gleaned from other sources. The value of such a book is the same as that of a very specific encyclopedia–it presents a host of information that most fans would be unable or unwilling to look up for themselves.

Whether or not Cumberbatch is as successful in the future as the author and many in the media and wider fandom expect, this book will continue to serve as an interesting signpost at the crossroads of a person’s life. Even those who have followed Benedict for some time will likely find new details to savor.

As a frequent user of Tumblr, a photo-heavy social networking site, I know firsthand that plenty of young people are as besotted today with Benedict Cumberbatch as I once was with the future king of England. Lynnette Porter has provided them, and their older counterparts, with a valuable guide to a fascinating career. No abysmal imitations need apply.

Purchase it here

The book reviewed above was provided for consideration by MX Publishing. All opinions expressed are the reviewer’s own. 

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The Detective, The Woman and The Winking Tree: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

The Detective and the Woman: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

Thursday Special: Sherlock Teas by Cara McGee

If you’re reading this blog, there’s a good chance you’ve heard of Cara McGee and her incredible fandom-inspired tea blends.

If not, here’s a quick rundown as I understand it. For a while now, loose-leaf tea company Adagio has given tea drinkers the option of creating their own blends with different teas and flavors, and Adagio would offer those blends for sale to other customers with similar taste.

Enter Cara McGee, a talented and creative artist who started making blends based on the shows she loved. Suddenly, a small niche on the Adagio Tea website turned into a massive fandom trend, particularly for fans of the BBC’s Sherlock series.

I’m here to tell you that if you haven’t become a part of this trend, you’re missing out. Cara doesn’t just slap tea flavors together for the sake of making something; her delicious blends actually reflect the personalities of the characters she’s representing.

For instance, Sherlock Holmes Tea tastes like drinking a bonfire, while John Watson Tea, my personal favorite, has a delightfully traditional base with a hint of the exotic.

I have yet to try a blend I haven’t enjoyed, and Cara offers something for everyone, from fruity herbal blends to strongly smoky offerings. In addition, the packaging of each blend features Cara’s beautiful original artwork.

Tea is the perfect accompaniment to an afternoon spent reading the Sherlock Holmes canon. Tea inspired by the detective himself is the icing on the cake.

Purchase Cara’s teas here 

Follow Cara on Twitter

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The Detective, The Woman and The Winking Tree: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

The Detective and the Woman: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

Book Review: (Holmesian) Christmas in July

July begins the second half of the year, and it’s a good time to start thinking about what to buy for people on your Christmas list. For most Sherlockians, books are always a welcome gift. Two yuletide-themed tomes recently caught my eye.

Sherlock Holmes: Have Yourself a Chaotic Little Christmas by Gwendolyn Frame is a frothy, charming advent calendar of Holmes stories, with one for each day of December. The tales range from serious to humorous, mysterious to comforting. Frame’s Holmes reads like the man as we might see him reflected in the flames of a warm holiday fire–touched with Christmas spirit and good cheer, without the sharper edges of his personality in evidence. The book would be an excellent stocking stuffer, or perhaps an entertaining decoration to adorn a book-lover’s coffee table during the holiday season.

Sherlock Holmes and the Missing Snowman by David Ruffle, with illustrations by Rikey Austin, is a Sherlockian children’s book as chock full of sweetness and warmth as a Christmas pudding. Just before Christmas, Sherlock Holmes is approached by a desperate little girl who can’t find the snowman she lovingly created and endowed with scarf and pipe. To Dr. Watson’s surprise, Holmes treats the mystery as seriously as any of his career, and the result is a story that could make even the Grinch crack a smile. The stunningly beautiful illustrations by Rikey Austin make this a can’t-miss gift for the budding Holmesians in your life.

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The Detective, The Woman and The Winking Tree: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

The Detective and the Woman: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

The books reviewed above were provided for consideration by MX Publishing.

Canon Thursday: Holmes’s Greatest Weakness

 

If you had to pick, what would you say is canonical Sherlock Holmes’s greatest weakness?

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The Detective, The Woman and The Winking Tree: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

The Detective and the Woman: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

Canon Thursday: More Room for Holmes?

Sherlockian author Charlotte Anne Walters asked an interesting question on her blog this week: Is the media market saturated with Holmes, or is there room for more? Everyone should hop over to her blog and take her poll on the subject.

Since I’m shameless that way, I’m going to borrow her topic. Charlotte brought up the still-untapped market of mainstream viewers who haven’t yet discovered Holmes, which is a very valid point. I’m going to go at it from a different angle.

For better or worse, the most recent Holmesian wave primarily owes its existence to the Big Three: The Guy Ritchie films, Sherlock, and Elementary. As a result of these three things individually and in different combinations, literal millions have suddenly joined a fandom that was alive and well before, but admittedly very much a niche interest.

Do I think the market is saturated? No, I don’t. I think it’s just about ready for a new, faithful, serious, Victorian adaptation to hit the English-speaking world. Now, before I lose my hearing from all the voices yelling at me that the Granada Holmes adaptations are what I’m talking about, I’m not disagreeing. However, as great as those were and are, there’s a large segment of the Holmesian fandom who simply isn’t going to go back to something that ended before they were born. And if they do, they will still have room for something new.

That’s the nature of visual media. I watch the Christopher Reeve Superman films or the original Stark Trek movies, but that doesn’t meant I have no room for new adaptations. Even brilliant franchises can handle a quality reboot every two decades, which is what we’re coming up on.

Much has been made of the fact that TV has led a new generation of fans toward the Holmes canon. I believe it’s coming up on time for those fans to see that canon find new life on screen, a life that is not only faithful to the stories in spirit (as Sherlock so brilliantly is), but also faithful to the time and place of Doyle’s world.

What do you think?

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The Detective, The Woman and The Winking Tree: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

The Detective and the Woman: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

Canon Thursday: Holmesian Fantasy Vacation

If you could take the ultimate Holmes-themed summer vacation with money as no object, where would you go, and what would you do?

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The Detective, The Woman and The Winking Tree: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

The Detective and the Woman: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

Book Review: The Amateur Executioner

 The new collaborative novel by two seasoned Sherlock Holmes novelists is a rare type of book for me to review, since it does not directly star Sherlock Holmes. Instead, the world’s greatest detective has a prominent supporting role in an entertaining 1920s mystery that also includes TS Eliot, WB Yeats, and several other historical characters.

The Amateur Executioner is the kind of book that can be enjoyed on several levels. Those who want an exciting, fast-moving, and action-filled mystery will appreciate its pace and wit, while those who are more interested in the Sherlock Holmes element will also find many subtle and clever references to the Doyle canon. Unexpectedly, there’s also a lot to love for those who appreciate classic literature and the writers of the early 20th century.

Read the rest at The Baker Street Babes

Buy the book here

This book was provided for consideration by MX Publishing.

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The Detective, The Woman and The Winking Tree: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

The Detective and the Woman: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

Women You Should Know

For some time now, I’ve been extremely impressed by the quality of editorial site Women You Should Know, a site that aims to draw attention to fascinating women and the creative and meaningful things they do.

Much to my amazement, gratitude, and delight, WYSK decided to profile me, and their article has gone live today. Read it here

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The Detective, The Woman and The Winking Tree: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

The Detective and the Woman: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

Book Review: Sherlock Holmes and The Case of the Crystal Blue Bottle

 

Graphic novels—throughout my life, they’ve been on the periphery of my consciousness, something I appreciate as an art form and sometimes leaf through in the bookstore, but rarely something I purchase. One of the only types that truly piques my interest is graphic novelizations of classic literature, particularly, of course, of the Holmesian variety. For this reason, I was very excited when I received a review copy of Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Crystal Blue Bottle, a collaboration with a story by Luke Benjamin Kuhns and artwork by several others, with royalties benefitting the Undershaw Preservation Trust, the group fighting to save Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s home from destruction.

The story itself is a straightforward murder mystery that wouldn’t be out of place in one of the Doyle short story collections. The artwork is varied, with sections 1 and 3 of the story in one style, while section 2 utilizes another. The final part of the book contains stunning additional artwork by several artists…

Read the rest of the review at the Baker Street Babes

Purchase the graphic novel here

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The Detective, The Woman and The Winking Tree: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.

The Detective and the Woman: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes is available from all good bookstores and e-bookstores worldwide including in the USA Amazon,Barnes and Noble and Classic Specialities - and in all electronic formats including Amazon Kindle , iTunes(iPad/iPhone) and Kobo.