Amy Thomas's Blog, page 16
June 22, 2012
The Sherlock Holmes Triviography and Quiz Book: Review
One of my great privileges in the Sherlockian world is to be able to write book reviews for the Baker Street Babes podcast. My latest one is a bit unusual. It’s a review of an expertly-crafted collection of Sherlock Holmes-related quizzes and word puzzles.
Here’s an excerpt from my review:
It’s a great time to enter the world of Sherlock Holmes. The BBC’sSherlock series and the Guy Ritchie Holmes films have ushered in millions of new fans, a great many of whom have gone on to explore the Granada TV series and the canonical stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. As a result, the glossy second edition of Kathleen Kaska’s engaging quiz collection comes at a particularly apt time
Kaska’s book consists of 80 quizzes covering the Holmes stories, the author, and much more, as well as five crossword puzzles. In addition, each section contains a small introductory essay with valuable information about aspects of the canon.
Read the rest at the Baker Street Babes Podcast.
* A copy of this book was provided for consideration by LL Publications.
If you enjoy this review, check out my Sherlock Holmes pastiche, The Detective and The Woman: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes, available now from Amazon US and UK, MX Publishing, and The Baker Street Babes Bookshop.
June 21, 2012
Canon Thursday: Favorite Holmesian Setting?
As I’ve said before, my favorite Sherlock Holmes story is “The Copper Beeches.” That’s also my favorite setting. I love the idea of a perfectly normal country house that suddenly seems creepy because of a few small touches and the people inside it.
How about you? Is Holmes’s beloved London city setting your favorite, or, like me, do you prefer something else? Let me know in the comments.
June 14, 2012
Canon Thursday: Story You Want to See
A few Canon Thursdays back, I asked my readers which Sherlock Holmes story they’d like to adapt if they had the chance. Today I’m asking which one you’d like to see on your screen, either as a film or television episode.
Here’s what I want to know:
1) Which story would you pick?
2) Why?
3) Which Holmes-verse do you want to see it in? I’m restricting us to current versions, so you can go for the BBC Sherlock series, a Ritchie film, or the new CBS version. (Or, you can invent your own and explain why)
My answers:
1) The Adventure of the Yellow Face
2) It’s a classic story with a hilarious twist, the fact that Holmes gets it wrong. The ending is extremely surprising, especially in a Victorian context.
3. I’d love to see the BBC series tackle an updated version of this story. I realize it’s a tricky one to do without being offensive, but I have faith that Moffat and Co could get it right.
What about you? Let me know your answers in the comments
June 9, 2012
Holmesian Serendipity
I’ve just learned that at the Scintillation of Scions in Maryland today, a copy of The Detective and The Woman was raffled off–and won by one of my fellow Baker Street Babes! I’m totally chuffed that my book was offered at such a great event and even more excited that such a lovely lady took it home.
June 7, 2012
Canon Thursday: Victorian or Not?
Before the BBC/Hartswood Sherlock series, if someone had asked me, I probably would have argued that the Victorian period aspect of Sherlock Holmes was so important that something couldn’t really be Sherlock Holmes without it. Things like House M.D. and Monk were worthy derivatives, but hardly actual stabs at Sherlock Holmes.
Then, in 2010, Steven Moffat and his merry band of incredible actors, writers, and producers messed with my head by making something that is so extremely Holmesian in essence without being at all traditional in setting and period. Admittedly, I’m a convert, and so are scores of my Holmesian friends.
The question is, is it a one-off? Has the BBC successfully liberated Holmes from his time in a way that can be done again, perhaps repeatedly, or are Moffat and co. the only ones who can get away with it? (Here’s looking at you, CBS)
What do YOU think? Let me know in the comments.
Purchase your copy of The Detective and The Woman: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes here (USA) and here (UK), as well as through Barnes and Noble, Kobo, and Book Depository (free shipping worldwide).
May 30, 2012
Saving Undershaw: The First Step
From the Undershaw Preservation Trust Website:
UPT Co-Founder Lynn Gale says, ”We did it! The team from all over the world has saved the former home of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle from development. The judge ruled in our favour this morning. Thank you to everyone for all their support.”
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s house is safe–for the moment.
I became a part of the Undershaw Preservation Trust over a year ago when I became one of the Florida representatives. At the time, I couldn’t believe that the home of such a prominent writer was under threat of imminent development by people who did not intend to preserve its historical legacy.
Things got even weirder–I found out that the British Historical Trust had refused to fully protect the house in the past because they claimed Sir Arthur wasn’t an important enough writer. (I’m not kidding-this is documented. You can google it.) I also found out that the incomparable Mark Gatiss of Sherlock acclaim was the patron of the Preservation Trust. How, I thought, with people like him and Stephen Fry on their side, could the Trust fail?
But then I looked up the legal stuff. I saw the condition the house is currently in, and I understood why citizens who live near it are eager to see it restored. For some, the idea of development seemed like a good plan because it would mean someone was doing something. To lovers of history like me, however, the idea was horrifying. Conan Doyle designed the home for his wife, lived in it for a decade, wrote The Hound of the Baskervilles there, and finally resurrected the world’s greatest detective during his residence there. The historical and literary significance is mind-boggling, not to mention that the house itself is an absolutely gorgeous example of turn-of-the-century architecture.
I’ll admit, I’ve been pretty pessimistic about the ruling for some time. Those of us involved with the Trust saw the court date postponed, naysayers decrying the chances, and a tide of legalese that seemed to be on the side of development.
Turns out The Undershaw Preservation Trust did its homework. When the home was greenlit for development, the proper legal steps were not taken. As a result, a judge has ruled that the development cannot go forward.
This is a truly joyful day for lovers of Sherlock Holmes and his creator’s home.
But it’s only the beginning. Undershaw still stands vacant, run-down, and in need of serious care. That care will require attention and funding for years to come. If we truly desire to preserve Undershaw as a piece of history, we can’t afford to stop working now.
We won, but winning is the very first step.
May 24, 2012
Canon Thursday: Story You’d Adapt
If you had a chance to take one Sherlock Holmes story and adapt it as a movie, play, radio play, or some other media, which would you choose and why?
Let me know in the comments
May 21, 2012
The Reichenbach Fall: Review
He is the Napoleon of crime, Watson. He is the organizer of half that is evil and of nearly all that is undetected in this great city. He is a genius, a philosopher, an abstract thinker. He has a brain of the first order. He sits motionless, like a spider in the center of its web, but that web has a thousand radiations, and he knows well every quiver of each of them.
–The Final Problem
Not, perhaps, the final problem, but certainly the biggest problem confronting the BBC’s Sherlock is always how to update stories and characters that are iconically Victorian without destroying the essence of the original. Steve Thompson (with input from Gatiss and Moffat, I’d imagine) had a particularly daunting challenge with which to contend this series, that of adapting a story that contains one of the most important events in the Sherlock Holmes canon but is at the same time, arguably, one of the least well-plotted of Conan Doyle’s stories.
In this reviewer’s opinion, The Reichenbach Fall not only matched Conan Doyle’s version–it was better.
Certainly, the Sherlock team could have chosen to stick closely to the original story. Holmes and Moriarty could have confronted one another, and Sherlock could have foreseen eventualities and dragged Watson to Switzerland for an emotional climax. But that’s not how Sherlock works. Unlike Conan Doyle, who chose to off Holmes using someone who hadn’t previously been mentioned, the BBC version has done a careful job of crafting Moriarty as Holmes’s nemesis from the first episode of Series 1 when his name is uttered by the dying cabbie. As a result, viewers needed the stakes to be high, both for the consulting detective and the consulting criminal, and the writers had a great deal to work with. In addition, Conan Doyle killed Holmes because he was tired of him. The show’s intention was the dead opposite–viewers want more of Holmes, not less, so the fall had to take into account the heartbreak that everyone knew was coming, like it or not.
The resulting episode was chilling, funny, beautiful, and heartbreaking. The fall’s conception as a philosophical rather than physical concept was surprising and horrifying, though its inevitable conclusion was extremely close in tone and spirit to the original. In an age of mobile phones and Internet, it makes sense for us to see Sherlock Holmes’s farewell rather than watching his friend find a note, and Mycroft’s ambiguity, while not strictly canonical, fit neatly with his characterization throughout both series.
Ample praise has already been heaped on Cumberbatch, Freeman, and Scott. I will just add that their Bafta nominations are more than deserved, and it’s a pity Freeman and Scott are pitted against each other in the same category.
Here’s to the Sherlock team for crafting a brilliant series of television capped off by a brilliant finale, and here’s to the 18 months we wait for the detective and the doctor to meet again. In the end, that’s what Sherlock is all about.
What did you think about the episode and about Sherlock Series 2? Let me know in the comments.
May 17, 2012
Canon Thursday: Funniest Moment in Sherlock Holmes
I’ve recently been invited to contribute to a Sherlock Holmes humor anthology, and that got me thinking about the one major thing that stood out to me when I re-read the Sherlock Holmes canon in 2010: the humor.
My first exposure to Holmes was before the age of 10, and during childhood, I was able to absorb the suspense and excitement, but the prevalent dry humor eluded me. As an adult re-reading the stories, I was delighted to find a great deal to giggle over in stories that were very familiar but at the same time not familiar at all because I was looking at them with mature eyes.
Many of Watson’s observations in the stories strike me as humorous, but one of my favorite lighter moments occurs in “The Adventure of the Yellow Face,” when Holmes drily utters, “Watson, if it should ever strike you that I am getting a little overconfident in my powers, or giving less pains to a case than it deserves, kindly whisper ‘Norbury’ in my ear, and I shall be infinitely obliged to you.”
Canon Thursday wants to know: What strikes you as funny in the Sherlock Holmes stories? Do you have a silly idea for a Sherlock Holmes humor piece that you wouldn’t mind me using? Let me know in the comments.
May 16, 2012
The Detective and The Woman: How to get it
It’s been a month since The Detective and The Woman: A Novel of Sherlock Holmes was officially released by MX Publishing, and it’s been a month filled with book-signing hijinks, lovely reviews, and increased availability. Here’s a master list of ways you can get the book, both as a paperback and as an e-book.
As a paperback:
The Baker Street Babes Bookshop (Portion of all proceeds helps out our podcast)
The Book Depository (ships free all over the world)
As an e-book:
Apple iBooks (purchasable through the app)
Amazon UK Kindle Version (I can’t link it because I’m in the US, but if you click into the paperback version, you’ll see a link to it)
Kobo (This link provides the e-Pub version, which works for nook, Sony, and many other e-readers)
