Author Interview with David Marcum on Beyond Watson, Volume IV of the MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories, and his Upcoming Sherlock Holmes Novel

It goes without saying that out of all the current Sherlock Holmes authors out there today, David Marcum is one of the very best. His books The Papers of Sherlock Holmes: Volume One, The Papers of Sherlock Holmes: Volume Two, and Sherlock Holmes – Tangled Skeins - Stories from the Notebooks of Dr. John H. Watson are some of the closest in voice to Doyle. He also edited and assembled the MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes series which is probably the best collection of Sherlock Holmes stories ever published outside of the original canon. I am proud to say that Mr. Marcum contributed a story to Beyond Watson, the Sherlock Holmes anthology currently available on Kickstarter.

I interviewed Mr. Marcum about his Beyond Watson story, the fourth volume of the MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories, and his forthcoming Sherlock Holmes novel.

1. Your story "Some Notes upon the Matter of John Douglas", is a "sort-of" sequel to The Valley of Fear, partly retold by Colonel Sebastian Moran. What made you decide to have some of your Beyond Watson story told by one of the great villains of the Canon?

David Marcum (DM): My method of coming up with these new Holmes adventures is to block out a few hours in front of the computer, sit down with coffee, and go into The Holmes Zone where Watson talks and I type, no plan or outline involved. I come back in a few hours with a few thousand words on the screen, an empty coffee cup, and a need to get up and walk it off. In this case, it wasn’t Watson that started talking to me, but rather Colonel Sebastian Moran. I think this story all came together to show that something that has long been perceived as one of Holmes’s failures was actually a triumph after all.

2. You have the only story in the anthology not completely told by someone besides Watson. Why did you decide to keep Watson's voice, instead of say Holmes or Lestrade, for some of your tale?

DM: Without giving anything away about the story before people read it, one can see that in the part narrated by Colonel Moran, he – like all of us – is trapped within his own head, and only knows of the events that he witnessed. If the story had ended with just his section, then the reader wouldn’t know the countermoves that Holmes, as the player on the other side, also made.




3. Beyond Watson has a unique requirement that the stories must be told, at least in part, by a character besides John H. Watson. Doyle rarely told his stories by anyone besides Watson (and if he did, it was either in third person or told by Holmes). Why do you think Doyle limited his tales to Watson's point of view?

Well, I play The Game with extreme seriousness, so the answer has to be that, as Watson’s Literary Agent, nearly all of the material that Doyle had to work with came from Watson, so of course it’s from Watson’s viewpoint. Later, Doyle Literary-Agented a couple of cases written up by Holmes, and also two others that worked better to be narrated from a third person perspective. After Doyle gave up Literary Agenting, and as Watson’s various other papers began to come to light, a lot of other more modern Literary Agents have helped to get these additional narratives into the hands of a public starving for more Holmes adventures. Additionally, over the years there have also been a great deal of other tales showing Holmes from points of view other than Watson’s, and they all work great as well.

4. Recently, you have become well known as the editor of The MX Books of New Sherlock Holmes Stories, the latest of which will be released on May 22nd, followed by a Christmas story collection to be released in autumn. All of the royalties from these books go to helping to restore Undershaw. Can you give the readers an update on the success of the anthologies as well as the ongoing restoration of Undershaw?

DM: It’s really exciting how this whole thing has happened. From the time I popped awake early one morning in January 2015, dreaming about editing a new Holmes anthology, to the appearance of the first collection of three books (The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories Part I: 1881 to 1889, The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories Part II: 1890 to 1895, The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories Part III: 1896 to 1929) in October, was an incredible ride of contacting authors, making decisions, keeping things on track, and most of all getting to read all of these new Holmes stories, fresh out of the Tin Dispatch Box. I can’t ever thank all the authors enough for participating. Now the renovation at Undershaw is nearing completion, and soon the school will be able to move in. The royalties from these books have already started being sent there and helping out.

After the books came out, I soon realized that the “machine” was still in place to make more of these anthologies, the Stepping Stones School at Undershaw can always use the additional support, and there is always a need for more great traditional Holmes stories – as shown by the success of Beyond Watson as well!

I put out the call for new adventures to both previously participating authors and also some new ones, and had 22 stories in my greedy fingers by the first part of 2016. In fact, there were so many people interested in participating that Steve Emecz and I decided to have two volumes this year, the Part IV – 2016 Annual, to be published on May 22nd, and the Part V – Christmas Adventures for later this year. And I already have half-a-dozen stories in hand and edited for the Part VI – 2017 Annual for next year!

5. You have been working on a new Sherlock Holmes novel. Without giving too much away, can you tell the readers what to expect from your latest Sherlock Holmes pastiche.

DM: I sat down last November with the intention of writing a short story for the proposed and upcoming collection featuring Holmes’s adventures while still living in Montague Street, before he moved to Baker Street. As always, I had no plan, and just eavesdropped and transcribed while Holmes told Watson about one of his old cases. At the end, the mystery having been cleared up, Holmes mentions that the next day he and Watson should take a trip to look at the object of this earlier investigation. And it should have ended there as a self-contained story. But then Watson kept talking to me about how they went the next day to look at the object, setting in motion a chain of events that could very well lead to a full-scale war. If I had ignored the good Doctor, it would have just been a short story, but it turned out to be my second Holmes novel, almost twice as long (114,000 words) as my first, Sherlock Holmes and A Quantity of Debt (2013). Even as I type this, I’ve finished the new book, except for the final final read-through. And now I’m getting ready to transcribe another Montague Street adventure for the upcoming collection – who knows where that will lead? Not me, since Watson hasn’t started talking yet.

6. Any last thoughts?

DM: As always, I can’t believe how lucky I’ve been over the last few years to get to play in this sandbox. From finding Holmes when I was ten in the mid-1970’s to when I was in my mid-40’s, I studied Holmes in solitude, reading and collecting thousands of pastiches, but living in a part of the country that has no Sherlockian interest in terms of clubs or societies. After writing and publishing my first Holmes book, The Papers of Sherlock Holmes (2011, 2013), I’ve been able to meet some really great people, and also participate in incredible Sherlockian conversations. And on top of all of that, more and more new and wonderful Holmes adventures keep getting published, and my addiction still isn’t anywhere near satisfied. This is truly a wonderful time to be a Sherlockian!

David Marcum first discovered Sherlock Holmes in 1975, at the age of ten, when he received an abridged version of The Adventures during a trade. He is the author of The Papers of Sherlock Holmes Volume 1 and 2, Sherlock Holmes and a Quantity of Debtand Sherlock Holmes – Tangled Skeins - Stories from the Notebooks of Dr. John H. Watson. Additionally, he is the editor of the three-volume set Sherlock Holmes in Montague Street (Sherlock Holmes In Montague Street Volume 1, recasting Arthur Morrison's Martin Hewitt stories as early Holmes adventures,) and the massive three-volume "The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories" (The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories Part I: 1881 to 1889, The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories Part II: 1890 to 1895, The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories Part III: 1896 to 1929). He has contributed essays to the "Baker Street Journal", "The Solar Pons Gazette", and "The Gazette", the journal of the Nero Wolfe Wolfe Pack.

Beyond Watson is currently available for a limited time on Kickstarter. Get your copy today!

Derrick Belanger is the author of the #1 bestselling book Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Peculiar Provenance which was in the top 200 bestselling books on Amazon. He also is the author of the MacDougall Twins with Sherlock Holmes books, the latest of which is Curse of the Deadly Dinosaur and edited the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle horror anthology A Study in Terror: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Revolutionary Stories of Fear and the Supernatural. His latest novella Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure Of The Primal Man is currently available as an ebook from Endeavour Press. Mr. Belanger also is a frequent contributor to the blog I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere. Mr. Belanger resides in Colorado and continues compiling unpublished works by Dr. John H. Watson.