The Five Orange Pips and Other Cases

by Arthur Conan Doyle

'He is the Napoleon of crime, Watson ... He sits motionless, like a spider in the centre of its web, but that web has a thousand radiations, and he knows well every quiver of each of them'

Sherlock Holmes, scourge of criminals everywhere, whether they be lurking in London's foggy backstreets or plotting behind the walls of an idyllic country mansion, and his faithful colleague Dr Watson, solve these breathtaking and perplexing mysteries. In Arthur Conan Doyle's The Five Orange Pips and Other Cases we encounter some of his most famous and devilishly difficult problems.

Genres: Classics, Short Stories, Mystery, Fiction, Crime, Victorian, Detective

336 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1892

About the author

Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle was a Scottish writer and physician. He created the character Sherlock Holmes in 1887 for A Study in Scarlet, the first of four novels and fifty-six short stories about Holmes and Dr. Watson. The Sherlock Holmes stories are milestones in the field of crime fiction.

Doyle was a prolific writer. In addition to the Holmes stories, his works include fantasy and science fiction stories about Professor Challenger, and humorous stories about the Napoleonic soldier Brigadier Gerard, as well as plays, romances, poetry, non-fiction, and historical novels. One of Doyle's early short stories, "J. Habakuk Jephson's Statement" (1884), helped to popularise the mystery of the brigantine Mary Celeste, found drifting at sea with no crew member aboard.

Reviews

[Lotte · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great collection of Sherlock Holmes stories that Arthur Conan Doyle put together for a newspaper contest where readers had to guess which of his short stories Conan Doyle himself considered to be the best. One reader got 10 out of the 12 stories right and won!
It was really interesting to see why the author thought the stories in this collection were his best work and I thoroughly enjoyed reading them!
I definitely recommend this for people who want to start reading Sherlock Holmes.

[Razvan Banciu · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is quite a poor one, even for Doyle's standards.
The story is less than credible and Sherlock Holmes is lazy enough to have his conscience guilty of the death of an innocent young man.

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

Second read of the 2020 Reading Rush and it was MUCH better than my first pick, thankfully, and I really enjoyed reading these cases! Very enjoyable, though obviously some of the opinions and stereotypes were a bit yikes. Anyway, I enjoyed this a lot more than I thought I would!

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading slumps are a pain.
That being said I finally picked myself back up and finished this and really enjoyed it. It maybe just a bias to anything Sherlock Holmes but these stories for me are fast and easy to read and very fun. I definitely found myself laughing out loud a few of Holmes's antics and I'm pretty excited to get another collection and continue my journey through his cases (I'll probably continue on to the Mary Russell books after that as I've heard they're just as good). I highly recommend these for any fan of the adaptations.

[Angharad · Rating 5 out of 5]

This would be a good collection of Holmes stories to start with. It has some of the key canon events including features from Mycroft, Moriarty and Irene Adler, as well as some more niche stories.

[Qothrunnada · Rating 4 out of 5]

4,5/5 ⭐️
Finally I made it before the year end haha😂 sedikit bangga bisa nyelesaiin buku klasik (meskipun aku gatau ini bahasa aslinya atau paraphrased) kumpulan kasus2 Sherlock Holmes. For Indonesian readers, imo bahasanya masih cukup bisa dipahami. Kasusnya juga seru, paling favorit ada 3: Dancing Men; Empty House; Devil’s Foot. Sherlock Holmes emang cerdas banget kalo masalah pemecahan kasus, humornya juga ada dikit2. BTW DISINI JUGA ADA CERITA THE FINAL PROBLEM👀
Menurutku Sir Arthur disini punya gaya narasi yg khas buat karya2 beliau. At least di buku ini pattern penulisan ceritanya hampir mirip antara satu dan yg lain, nggak terlalu neko2 kyk cerita detektif jaman now (yaiyalah namanya juga klasik)

[lucy snow · Rating 4 out of 5]

i love the sherlock holmes stories! so far i have only read the longer ones, but it was brilliant to read the short stories. they are easily digestible in one sitting, and incredibly satisfying to read. a case is presented, holmes and watson look for clues, then sherlock reveals the perpetrator and explains his thought process completely.

surprisingly the story that lacked vigour for me was the adventure of the final problem, the most 'lore heavy' of the work, as it didn't follow the same tried and tested format that we were used to by this point. holmes' death means we get no explanation for the events that have taken place.

my favourites were a scandal in bohemia, the adventure of the dancing men, and the adventure of the speckled band. the red-headed league by far the craziest!

the relationship between holmes and watson was undoubtably the best part of the collection. it was also fun to see the references that the bbc show makes to the original source material, specific lines that were taken and repurposed, or names and cases alluded to.

i can't wait to read more!

[Aniek Verheul · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is such a great collection of stories! There’s an essay at the end of this collection in which the author explains why these are his favourite Sherlock stories, which was interesting to read and makes a lot of sense. I did find some stories more enjoyable than others. The Adventure of the Speckled Band, The Adventure of the Red-Headed League, and The Musgrave Ritual were my favourites, while I didn’t really care for The Adventure of the Final Problem or The Reigate Squires. Overall, though, these stories are short and pack a punch, which makes them very fun to read. I think I like these more than the longer Sherlock adventures!

[Deli · Rating 3 out of 5]

It took me 3 months a half to read the first half of this book, and 1 day to read the second half. Not very relevant to the review, but I thought it was funny.

Some of these short stories really made me lose interest, but others were quite entertaining, with some being really great. Overall, it ended up being a solid read.

[Jade · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sherlock Holmes works a lot better in short story form. I'm listening to the Stephen Fry audio books alongside reading. Makes for a truly unique experience.

Favourites - The Adventure of the Final Problem, A Scandal in Bohemia, The Adventure of the Speckled Band, The Musgrave Ritual.

[Elsary · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Scandal in Bohemia, The Speckled Band and the Dancing Men are some of my favourite Holmes stories, and I was delighted to find out this collection included them all. This collection has the 12 stories Conan Doyle considered the best ones, and thus I must say he had good taste.

[Lewis Kettell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Whilst I would rather it give 3.5 stars, I feel this collection of stories encapsulates the mood, the feeling and vibe of the good Dr Watson and the incomparable Sherlock Holmes.

I feel that Holmes and Watson are best experienced in a longer form story, these shorter stories are mostly entertaining and hold up more despite being over 100 years old.

With the League of the Red haired gentleman being my favourite story and some of the later stories in the book being not as entertaining, I would still argue that it is a needed read as your favourite story may differ to mine

Recommended 👍👍

[alisha · Rating 5 out of 5]

this saved me from the atrocious slump i’ve been in, thank you to my kings holmes and watson

[Kat · Rating 4 out of 5]

Doyle‘s stories were essential in paving the way for the genre of crime fiction and murder mysteries. His way of pairing up two very different characters (tall-small, clever-dumb, sarcastic-mild, thin-fat) has been copied hundreds of times and has become a quintessential trope for TV-series, movies and books dealing with detective/ police duos or teams.

This was my first time reading Doyle‘s stories in their original language. Of course, one is acquainted with them; through hear-say and movies or audiobooks. But reading them was quite different.
Not only to John Watson but to the readers themselves does Sherlock Holmes seem like a magician, being able to reconstruct even the most abstruse cases and incidents, that is until he explains how, by the use of his mind and simple logic, he has managed to solve yet another mystery.

Doyle‘s way of constructing the adventures and cases is witty and always left me yearning for the solution I myself could not seem to work out.
Yet what I could not help but notice his stance on people of colour and women. In some of his stories his misogynist attitudes are not only brought forward by Sherlock Holmes himself (who is known to have less respect for the "weaker sex" than for men), but through the way the stories are told and in one case the "weaker constitution of the female sex" is used as an evidential fact in support of the solution of a case.



The Sherlock Holmes stories are without any doubt classics and really fun to read. They provide their readers with entertaining, clever and mysterious stories and are thus perfect to forget about reality and the rest of the world. Yet, it is important to keep in mind that they are not perfect or inclusive (apart from some exceptions) and therefore should not be glorified as such.

[Micheala · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sherlock Holmes short stories are always fun, but also they feel just a touch like the author didn't actually know how to pepper in the hints needed to make them believably solvable. In truth though, you don't go into these stories thinking that there is any way that you'll be able to figure it out until it's explained (I mean sometimes you can guess the villain based on stereotypes and tropes, but not the how/why)

At first when reading this edition I couldn't figure out /why/ they picked the stories they did as it's a mix from the Adventures, the Memoirs and the Return of Sherlock Holmes. The little piece at the end from a 1927 magazine that lists these twelve stories as what Doyle considered to be the best of Sherlock was a great addition to explain the reasoning behind which stories got grouped together.

[R.L. · Rating 4 out of 5]

English review below the Greek one...

Συλλογή 12 ιστοριών με πρωταγωνιστή τον Σέρλοκ Χολμς. Ξέρει κανείς τι να περιμένει... Λιγάκι αφελείς και υπερβολικές και κάποιες καλύτερες από άλλες, αλλά πάντα ελαφρύ, ευχάριστο ανάγνωσμα... Τις συγκεκριμένες ιστορίες τις διάλεξε ο ίδιος ο Ντόιλ ��ο 1927 σαν τις 12 καλύτερες ανάμεσα στις σύντομες δικές του, για το περιοδικό Strand όπου είχαν δημοσιευθεί πολλές ιστορίες του και όπου έγινε διαγωνισμός με έπαθλο 100 λίρες. Οι αναγνώστες καλούνταν να μαντ��ψουν ποιες ιστορίες θα επέλεγε ο συγγραφέας και τελικά ο νικητής βρήκε τις 10 από τις 12. Ο Ντόιλ δημοσίευσε ένα μικρό άρθρο (που βρίσκεται στο τέλος του βιβλίου) όπου εξηγεί το σκεπτικό του και την επιλογή των συγκεκριμένων 12.

In 1927, The Strand Magazine challenged its readers to guess correctly the 12 Sherlock Holmes' short stories that Arthur Conan Doyle hisself considered the best. The winner got a £100 price, finding out 10 out of the 12 stories that Doyle had selected. The epilogue features the article where the author explains how and why he chose these specific stories.

This book is a collection of exactly these 12 stories. Arthur Conan Doyle is a product of his time and given his own pecularities and one's mood at the time of reading, his works can feel genius or ridiculous.
On my opinion, they were sometimes a bit naive and superficial, some stories better than others, but it was definitely a pleasant, cozy book to pass the time.

[Hanie Noor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hands down the best classic I’ve read after so long and this made it to my all time favourite list. This novel is a compilation of short stories that Arthur Conan Doyle used to publish in The Strand Magazine so the publisher ran a competition to name the best twelve Sherlock Holmes stories hence, this awesome read. I do believe it will be easy for you to breeze through them as these are short stories.
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My favourite is definitely the unforeseen Adventure of The Final Problem where Holmes risked his life at Reichenbach Falls to go against Moriarty and save the day. When you read, you will surely guess what’s going to happen next and it’s gonna be boring because you know what to expect anyway but that’s not the case with this one. I love how the author unfold each cases which sometimes unexpected. Writing wise, I have no problem understanding but some would probably struggle because it was published somewhere around 1890s so you can guess how the language style differ.
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Reading this made me feel refreshed and felt like I wanted to read mystery/thriller again. That’s why I prefer to switch genres one after another to avoid feeling bored or getting reading slump.

[Abi Pellinor · Rating 4 out of 5]

When the Buzzwordathon prompt in February asked for a book with a colour in the title I had limited choices (looks like the books I pick up don't match Kayla's!) so this was my only option, but I wasn't mad because I adore Sherlock Holmes and I knew I would fly through this!

I'm sure you know the Holmes stories by now, we follow our detective in the 1800s as he uses his powers of deduction and his knowledge of 243 different types of tobacco ash to solve mysteries of death, murder, and deception. Despite being Conan Doyle's least favourite character to write, he captured the heart of a nation and we would not let him go!

I had read some of these stories not that long ago, when I read The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. So I decided to skip over those and pick the ones I hadn't read this. There were actually one or two new to me in here which was lovely as I had been worried they would all be rereads.

This was exactly what I expected, a fun read, an enjoyable romp through the deductive mind of Holmes/Doyle and I will always enjoy these books!

[P K · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was actually my first foray into the Sherlock Holmes world, and I think it was a good one to start with as the stories in the collection were chosen by Doyle himself as the best of the Holmes stories (the end of the book includes a section detailing why he chose each story). I found them quite engaging, often quite funny. It's a credit to the author's finesse that the stories don't start to read as too formulaic when read in a row. I did think a couple of the leading clues seemed too post hoc (the strength of the evidence was too conjectural to lead to a strong conclusion, but it was a primary clue in the story) especially in the last story. However, I quite enjoyed the read. I picked this book up because I was staying in a stranger's room on vacation and reading all the books I had time to read during those few weeks.

[Marianne · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 stars!

An excellent collection of Sherlock Holmes cases :D It has everything that I adored in The Hound of the Baskervilles: the clever mysteries, the straightforward narratives, and the precious character that is Sherlock Holmes himself. As custom with any short story collections I read, I pick my favorites. For this one The Adventure of the Speckled Band, The Adventure of the Dancing Men, and The Adventure of the Devil's Foot were among my favs. I couldn't get enough of these stories. The fact that they are pretty short makes it fairly easy to breeze through them. There isn't much to say other than I have a dire need to get hold of the other stories right away.

[Teri-K · Rating 4 out of 5]

These Sherlock Holmes stories were selected by Doyle as his favorites for a contest hosted by The Strand magazine. The end of the book has an interesting explanation from his on how he chose these particular stories, and I enjoyed reading each explanation before I read the story itself.

The book begins with The Adventure of the Speckled Band. It's the first Holmes I ever read, when I was eight or nine. I still remember it very well. I was reading a thick book of collected stories for kids, and this is the only one I remember from it, but it really made an impression on me. It's still very good, and was the first story Doyle chose for his top twelve.

This is a good selection, showing how creative Doyle was with his plots. For anyone who thinks a collection of mystery short stories will be one murder or theft after the other, this book should change that. There are secret codes, orange pips (seeds), scams and poison and all manner of mysterious goings on. I really enjoyed these, those one or two didn't feel as strong as the rest. It's also interesting to read why Doyle chose each story for the collection. I recommend this to fans and newcomers to Holmes alike.

[georgie_porgie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant. The cases, although brief, were still mystifying and complex enough to keep me intrigued, and always had that satisfying but infuriating kick-yourself-for-not-solving-it quality. Also, since it was a collection of short story cases, there was no pressure to keep at the book! I started in January, read about half, then finished up in December! Lovely to still know exactly what is going on.

[Ffion-Hâf · Rating 3 out of 5]

Whilst I did enjoy parts if this book, I felt like I was reading the same story over and over and over again (with a few exceptions). My favourites were The Adventure of the Red-Headed League as it was so outlandish and The Regiate Squires as it didn’t feel Holmesy. It is undoubtedly a coever book however Holmes’ monologues at the end of each tale were overly verbose, stalling the narrative too much and therefore I got bored of reading his surmises.

(This is a 2.5* read rounded up to a 3)

[Anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow...3 months!?
I guess my only two excuses are the following:
1. I read it between other books and the 2. I didn't want it to end. Sherlock Holmes is one of my favorite character in all of literture and his mind is extraordinary and beautiful and these short stories are The best of Sherlock Holmes!

[Patsy Collins · Rating 4 out of 5]

There's a lot packed into each of these stories – they don't make for the quick easy read you might expect from a short story collection, but they're definitely interesting enough to be worth the concentration required. I loved the way Sherlock's deductions seem almost obvious once they're explained, yet very few are worked out by others until he does that.

[shroom-boi · Rating 4 out of 5]

with the numerous adaptations of sherlock holmes, both over the years and especially within recent years (please make some new movies y'all), it's always very entertaining to actually go back and read the originals. they'll probably remain my favourite version of holmes.

[Jamie March · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed re-reading these cases knowing they are Arthur Conan Doyle’s favourites. Probably can’t be enjoyed without having already read the complete works as they don’t realllyyyy make sense together but definitely some of his best works :))

[Gordon Watson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Classic ACD. Have read before, but not this particular edition, thoroughly enjoyable.

[Désirée · Rating 4 out of 5]

As I have read all short stories except one I will mark this as read. I am collecting all the Penguin Library editions concerning Sherlock Holmes.

[Jessica Greve · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another quick one. But one where our famous detective may not win.