Sherlock Holmes Investigates

by Arthur Conan Doyle

A collection of some of detective Sherlock Holmes's best-known cases. Using his famous powers of deduction and observation he tracks down criminals through the gaslit streets of Victorian London, with the help of his friend Dr Watson.

Conan Doyle's famous detective is always at his best when faced with an 'unsolvable' crime, following the smallest of clues to unravel the mystery.

Adventure of the speckled band --
Adventure of the blue carbuncle --
Adventure of the six napoleons --
Adventure of the dancing men --
Silver blaze --
The Reigate puzzle --

Genres: Classics, Fiction, Crime, Mystery

178 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1963

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

[Jinky · Rating 5 out of 5]

Recently for date night my husband and I saw the movie Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows and I absolutely loved it! So I had to get my hands on the book. Well, I ended up with this compilation instead. What a gem of a find. According to this book, Sir Doyle wrote 4 long stories and 56 short ones. This collection gave an excerpt of one of the long ones and six short ones, indeed a wonderful introduction to new readers of Sherlock Holmes stories. I ate it all up! I think I found myself a favorite mystery author and character. I enjoyed the cleverness of the Sherlock Holmes adventures and his summations of them ... reminds me of the TV series Monk but I would put Sherlock Holmes in a class of elegance.

Just to note the stories that are included in this book:
•Mr Sherlock Homes Meets Dr. Watson
•The man with the Twisted Lip
•The Speckled Band
•The Red-headed League
•The Engineers Thumb
•The Reigate Squires
•The Blue Carbuncle

My quote-ables:

"I have usually found that there was ethod in his madness. Some folk might say there was madness to his method." The Reigate Squires

"My name is Sherlock Homes. It is my business to know what other people don't know." The Blue Carbuncle


Jinky is Reading

[Bruna Limeira · Rating 3 out of 5]

The three tales introduce us to a famous character: Sherlock Holmes, and his friend Watson. However, in those short stories, not only does Holmes discover the cases but he doesn´t do anything to change the given situation. In addition, those three stories have some plot holes. At first sight, those holes don´t appear as uncomfortable. But, at second sight, it takes the lightning of Sherlock Holmes.
Considering that Sherlock Holmes is a very rational, logical, and smart detective, and the story plots need to be, therefore, extremely elaborated. In the first tale, for example, the story ends leaving with the following question on hold: “Who’s really got the blue carbuncle”? In the second story, how did Holmes actually influence the story? In the last one, what did he investigate?
Despite these inherent questions, those tales do seem to have interesting plots; so that the reader gets curious and deeply involved in the story.

[Grishma · Rating 5 out of 5]

What's not to love about Sherlock and Watson? I liked all of the short stories which despite being short, not in the slightest feels rushed. They draws you in with unique circumstances of each case and a promise of satisfaction of solving crime and mystery.

It's also a great option when you can't read for extended hours and have few minutes to cram in some reading.

[Andrew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Each story - brilliant deductions

[Rob · Rating 2 out of 5]

First of all I've never read any 'Sherlock Holmes' books so this review may be lacking in certain areas of understanding of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's work.

I'm not sure if it's my aversion to short stories that made me dislike this book or the fact that it just did not work.
I'm leaning towards the latter of the two as I've read detective fiction in the form of short stories before in the form of Agatha Christie's 'The Thirteen Problems', which I actually rather enjoyed. I think this was more to do with the fact that it was a group of people telling short murder stories to other people, while this book was just Watson going on about how great Holmes is.

For this book, 30 pages for a crime novel just doesn't seem to be enough.
It becomes more about the ingeniousness of the author or Holmes, the intellectual hero of the book, than any real mystery.
We are obviously surrounded by a crime that seems curious but in most of these short stories, the amount, or lack of amount, of characters means it is so easy to deduce who committed the crime. Hence, the story becomes about how and why the crime was committed.

The collection of stories just seems a way of boosting the fictional ego of Sherlock Holmes, which is very bizarre!
I think it could be laziness on the author's part, as these cases could easily be inserted into a separate novel, which would probably make an interesting read.

Overall, I enjoyed some of the bizarre and clever ways a crime was carried out, but short crime stories, in my opinion, tend to not work, as this book exemplifies.

[Juliet Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very enjoyable. Takes great ingenuity and creativity to set up and solve an unusual crime in 30 pages, and convey the characters of Holmes and Watson. Actually preferred these short stories to some of the longer length mysteries.

[Hermien · Rating 3 out of 5]

Three enjoyable typical Sherlock Holmes mysteries.

[Literary Mama]

As an avid audiobook listener, I have crossed all genres from YA literature to the ancient classics. My favorites will always be adventures and mysteries though. While I often check out audiobooks from my local library, I also love Librivox, which is a fantastic resource of free audiobooks in the public domain. The readers are all volunteers, so the quality can be a little hit-or-miss, but there are some real gems. For example, I love Bob Neufeld's recordings of the Sherlock Holmes stories. Written by Arthur Conan Doyle, these detective novels are fantastic as audiobooks, and Neufeld is an expressive narrator with a memorable voice. I have very fond memories of the recordings from my cross-country road trip honeymoon when they made some very long days in the car so much more fun. I also love Elizabeth Klett's narrations of some ninetenth-century favorites, including Austen, Gaskell, and the Brontes. She is a thoughtful reader whose voice colors the stories without caricaturing or hyperbolizing, which can be a risk in this genre. Librivox is a fantastic resource for audiobook lovers on a budget, and these readers in particular produce high quality narrations of classic stories that are accessible to everyone.