I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere: Derrick Belanger

Showing posts with label Derrick Belanger. Show all posts

Murder in Minnesota! Book Review

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<b>"this double crime" [VALL] </b></h4>
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Several years ago, I saw author <a href="http://www.petehautman.com/" target="_blank">Pete Hautman</a> speak at a Young Adult Writer's conference in Denver. Hautman explained to the crowd that when he submitted his book <i>How to Steal a Car</i> to his agent, his agent was surprised that Pete had written a young adult novel. The agent explained to the author that it was young adult because it had a fifteen year-old protagonist. Hautman replied that he just wrote a book. He didn't intend for it to be considered "young adult" in nature.<br />
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The same could be said for Jeff Falkingham's excellent <i><a href="https://amzn.to/2le3kvN">Murder in Minnesota!</a></i> a book combining two of his Sherlock Holmes adventures and both with the same narrator, Petey Smith who is 12 years old in the first story and then 22 in the second.  The stories are well researched, capture the local flavor of life in both small towns and cities in late 19th century Minnesota, and are excellent Sherlock Holmes mysteries. For those who don't mind seeing the great detective outside of England, this is a must have collection.<br />
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The first adventure, <i>Sherlock Holmes and the County Courthouse Caper</i>, takes place in 1886 when Holmes helps solve a series of grisly murders in The Minnesota River Valley.  The narrator of this adventure is 12 year old Petey Smith who, along with his family, befriends Holmes.<br />
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Petey makes for a fun narrator, giving us a child's eye view of a complex mystery. Imagine if Wiggins had narrated part of <i>The Sign of the Fou</i>r, and you get an idea of the tone for this book. Falkingham does a particularly good job of blending in historical facts about Minnesota and includes an authentic historic railroad map of Western Minnesota which is important to the story.  Falkingham also has good knowledge of Sherlock Holmes lore. Fans of Baring-Gould's take on Holmes will know why Holmes was in America in 1886.<br />
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I only caution that the murder victims in the book are described in savage detail and may be disturbing for sensitive young readers. I'd give the book a PG-13 rating, definitely okay for teenagers, but may be too intense for tweens.<br />
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The second adventure, <i>Sherlock Holmes: In Search of the Source</i> takes place ten years after the Courthouse Caper. Petey is still the narrator, but he is older, on the verge of getting married. The mystery of this adventure involves a murder committed at the Schutte building, a boarding house in St. Paul. This story feels much more like a traditional Holmes adventure.<br />
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Petey, at age 22, sounds much more like a young Watson, and the adventure plays out more like a typical Doyle story with grumbling police, a mysterious man following Holmes, and Petey telling the reader of Holmes's incredible skills of deduction. Falkingham also keeps up with blending in his historical facts about Minnesota into the narrative.<br />
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We learn that St. Paul could have been named Pig's Eye if fate had taken a different turn, and much about the beer barons in the St. Paul area. My only complaint with this story is that at times I felt that the historic information got in the way of the narrative and the story was a little padded. That is a minor quibble, and I would still give this adventure five stars.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://amzn.to/2le3kvN"><img alt="Two Sherlock Holmes books in one - Murder in Minnesota!" border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="533" height="200" src="https://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/swnewsmedia.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/9/31/931e2869-6c19-5f3c-9b0c-bf0bda721bf3/5ac2bd3a9232e.image.jpg" title="Murder In Minnesota by Jeff Falkingham" width="133" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://amzn.to/2le3kvN">Buy it now!</a></td></tr>
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For those of you who don't mind reading Sherlock Holmes adventures away from the foggy streets of London and sans Watson as narrator, <i><a href="https://amzn.to/2le3kvN">Murder in Minnesota!</a></i> is a book for you. Falkingham is a talented writer, and I hope he writes more Holmes adventures with Petey Smith. After all, there is plenty of time in the twentieth century when Holmes could have returned to Minnesota.<br />
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<i><b>Jeff Falkingham </b>has been a fan of Sherlock Holmes since he first saw Peter Cushing in The Hound of the Baskervilles (1959). Besides writing two pastiches about Holmes, Jeff has created a program that has drawn rave reviews at more than 90 libraries, schools, historical societies and social clubs and book clubs across Minnesota and its neighboring states. <b>He will be appearing  at the the triennial Holmes conference in Minneapolis August 8-11. Visit him at his Dealer's Table.</b></i><br />
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<i><b>Bonus Content:</b></i></h3>
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<a href="https://ihose.co/ihose166">Episode 166: Dark Places, Wicked Companions, and Strange Experiences</a> is a look at the upcoming Minnesota conference.<br />
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<i>Derrick Belanger is the author of the #1 bestselling book in its category <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Sherlock-Holmes-Adventure-Peculiar-Provenance/dp/1519511957/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d&linkCode=ktl">Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Peculiar Provenance</a><img border="0" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d&_cb=1451973203084" />, 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 <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Deadly-Dinosaur-MacDougall-Sherlock-Holmes-ebook/dp/B017862MVS/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa&linkCode=ktl">Curse of the Deadly Dinosaur</a><img border="0" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa&_cb=1451973247482" />, and he edited the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle horror anthology <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Study-Terror-Revolutionary-Stories-Supernatural-ebook/dp/B00P4E8AVI/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a&linkCode=ktl">A Study in Terror: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Revolutionary Stories of Fear and the Supernatural</a><img border="0" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a&_cb=1451973259426" />. Mr. Belanger is co-owner the publishing company <a href="http://www.belangerbooks.com/">Belanger Books</a> which focuses on new Sherlock Holmes anthologies such as <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Watson-Sherlock-Anthology-Stories/dp/1533202273/">Beyond Watson</a>, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Sherlock-Holmes-Before-Baker-Street-ebook/dp/B071G6D1BD">Sherlock Holmes: Before Baker Street</a>, and <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07QZ3W4CR">Sherlock Holmes: Adventures in the Realms of Steampunk</a>. Also, In 2018, Belanger Books released the first ever ebook editions of the original <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07L32N24C">Solar Pons</a> books. Derrick resides in Colorado and continues compiling unpublished works by Dr. John H. Watson.</i>

Murder in Minnesota! Book Review

"this double crime" [VALL] Several years ago, I saw author Pete Hautman speak at a Young Adult Writer's conference in D...

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by Belanger Books

What do You Get When You Cross Sherlock Holmes with Jane Austen?

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Jennifer Petkus has added two equal cups of Sherlock Holmes and Jane Austen, a teaspoon of P.G. Wodehouse, and even a dash of Douglas Adams to create a unique and entertaining pastiche in the Charlotte House affair series.  I interviewed the author via email to see what inspired her to create an intriguing Victorian mash-up.</div>
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<b>I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere: <i> </i></b>Your "A Charlotte House Affair" series blends Sherlock Holmes with the world of Jane Austen.  How and why did you blend the two worlds together?</h4>
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<b>Jennifer Petkus (JP):</b> I discovered Sherlock Holmes when I was about eight years old, so he and Watson are old friends, but I began reading Jane Austen in my fifties. I had avoided reading any Austen in high school or college, being fonder of science fiction and mysteries, but even had I read her then, I doubt I would have appreciated her.</div>
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I was so excited by Austen that I wanted to write something set in her time and with an appreciation of her language. Not surprisingly, however, there’s a whole industry of Jane Austen fan fiction with pastiches, continuations and alternate realities of her novels. Austen’s characters have been cast as detectives and Jane Austen herself has solved crimes. This is all very similar to the situation in the Sherlockian world, of course, and I realized it would be even more difficult to stand out in Austen-land.</div>
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It was an inadvertent remark while walking the dog with my husband that led to the crossover. I’ve always been fond of the phrase “my particular friend,” which I first encountered in Charles Dicken’s <i>A Christmas Carol</i>. It’s a phrase you’ll also find in Austen and other writing from the time. (To my knowledge, it only occurs once in the Canon, Mary Morstan referring to Major Sholto as a “very particular friend” of her father in <i>The Sign of Four</i>.)</div>
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I suddenly realized that Holmes is Watson’s very particular friend as well, and I appreciated the double meaning indicating Watson’s strong friendship and Holmes’s peculiar tendencies.</div>
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At the same time I was reading <i>Emma</i>, my favorite of Austen’s six novels. Emma Woodhouse is a beautiful young woman who is adored by her friends and family. She is devoted to her widowed, valetudinarian father and has decided she will never marry, probably because she worries what her removal would do to her father. Although she’s a very likable character (despite Austen’s description of her as a heroine no one will very much like), she believes that because of her station in life (her father is very rich) and a misguided belief in her own intuition, that she knows what is best for others. She acts as a matchmaker for her particular friend, Harriet Smith, the natural (illegitimate) daughter of some man who has paid for her to be educated in a private school for disadvantaged young women. (Austen’s description of Mrs. Goddard’s school is wonderful: “a real, honest, old-fashioned Boarding-school, where a reasonable quantity of accomplishments were sold at a reasonable price, and where girls might be sent to be out of the way, and scramble themselves into a little education, without any danger of coming back prodigies.”)</div>
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Unfortunately Emma’s matchmaking goes awry. It turns out she is no great detective in matters of the heart and constantly chooses the wrong suitor for Harriet, while also being blind to her own desires. She is, in fact, a sort of Sheer Luck Holmes, a clueless detective whose one early success leads her to believe she has a gift for uniting lovers.</div>
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So in Emma, I had a not so great detective and her particular friend, Harriet. It was not much of a leap for me to transform Emma Woodhouse into Charlotte House and Harriet Smith into Jane Woodsen.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i style="font-size: small;">Our Mutual Friends</i><span style="font-size: x-small;"> is the second book in the </span><span style="font-size: x-small; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">"A Charlotte House Affair"</span><span style="font-size: x-small;"> </span><span style="font-size: x-small;"> series</span></span></td></tr>
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<b>IHOSE: </b>Your Holmes and Watson characters (House and Woodsen) are female. What made you decide to switch their genders? What surprised you about writing the Doyle characters as female protagonists?</h4>
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<b>JP: </b>I suddenly realized that simply by making Emma into an actual detective in matters of the heart, that I had my version of Holmes and Watson. Charlotte House became a young woman who decided like Emma that she would never marry, but I had to give her a suitably romantic and tragic back-story to explain her resolve.</div>
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Charlotte is beautiful, rich and like Holmes has accumulated that specialist knowledge she requires. Like Emma, she remains close to her former governess. Mrs Fitzhugh actually lives with Charlotte and was her chaperone when Charlotte was about her investigations. As a single, young woman, Charlotte must always be above reproach.</div>
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Jane Woodsen is a young woman whose family has fallen on hard times. With her parents dead, Jane has chosen to live on her own and find work as a governess. A governess is one of the few employment options Jane has. She’s the daughter of a gentleman (her father owned land) and so would avoid work as a laborer. Her chances of an advantageous marriage are negligible as she has now dowry.</div>
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Unfortunately a governess is neither above nor below stairs. The family would treat her as a servant and the servants would not treat her as one of their own. Governesses were often very lonely figures in literature. Luckily Charlotte befriends Jane and takes her on as her protégé.</div>
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I found it surprisingly easy to make Sherlock Charlotte and John Jane, with the added advantage of an intimacy that we rarely glimpse between Holmes and Watson. For all their friendship, Holmes and Watson never call each other by their first names even though we know how devoted they are to one another. It’s really enjoyable to explore the Holmes-Watson dynamic and I drew from my female friends to create Charlotte, while I am the basis for Jane.</div>
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<b>IHOSE: </b>Your first book in the series, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/My-Particular-Friend-Charlotte-Affair/dp/0615597467/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1520316230&sr=1-1&keywords=my+particular+friend+petkus">My Particular Friend</a>,</i> was similar to a collection of Holmes short stories. Your second book, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Mutual-Friends-Charlotte-House-Affair/dp/1541054989/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_2?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=1541054989&pd_rd_r=29FK37MYHH8S53TJ3CP5&pd_rd_w=l9fNl&pd_rd_wg=ZHZaI&psc=1&refRID=29FK37MYHH8S53TJ3CP5">Our Mutual Friends</a></i>, is a novel with several interwoven plots. Did you set out to write two different types of books or did it just shift organically?</h4>
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<b>JP:</b> It was a conscious decision to alternate. <i>My Particular Friend</i> is set in Bath, which in the late 18th and early 19th century was a marrage market, where wealthy parents would take their children to encounter a larger pool of prospective mates. So <i>My Particular Friend</i> focused on shorter stories so that I could establish Charlotte’s reputation as marriage counselor.</div>
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<i>Our Mutual Friends</i> is set in London and I decided that the stakes should be raised. The stories involve real intrigue and danger. I intentionally borrowed from <i>The Hound of the Baskervilles</i> the device of making Charlotte absent from much of the book, focusing on Jane’s burgeoning skills as a detective. It might be that I also drew from <i>Elementary</i>’s Joan Watson in this.</div>
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I also wanted to explore the idea my characters would have to resolve multiple mysteries. In the Canon, Holmes often has multiple cases but those secondary cases rarely affect the main plot. I liked the idea of my Watson concealing her own investigation from Charlotte.</div>
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<b>IHOSE:</b> While Doyle and Austen are the biggest inspirations for your series, I note that P.G. Wodehouse also sneaks in.  Why did you incorporate Wodehouse? Are there any other authors I've missed?</h4>
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<b>JP:</b> Bertie Wooster and his valet Jeeves share many similarities to Holmes and Watson, of course. Bertie is forever trying to help a friend for whom the laughing love god has ceased smiling and inevitably making a mess of things until the far wiser Jeeves rescues his master. Although every Jeeves and Wooster story is about making love conquer all, Jeeves’ primary goal is to keep his master unmarried, for when the new wife arrives, the old valet departs. So my Jeeves (Cheevers) makes a perfect foil for Charlotte.</div>
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Of course my other great inspiration for <i>Our Mutual Friends</i> is Charles Dickens’ <i>Our Mutual Friend</i>. As in Dickens’ story, I tried to make the Thames, water, rebirth and reinvention central elements. Like John Harmon in <i>Our Mutual Friend</i>, my Prince Nanaboo is born from the waters of the great river.</div>
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<b>IHOSE:</b> A question that I ask all Sherlockians: If you were stranded on a desert island with just one Sherlock Holmes story, which would it be and why?</h4>
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<b>JP:</b> If I’m allowed a novel, it would be <i>The Sign of Four</i>. There is nothing to compare with that boat chase on the Thames with Tonga firing his poison arrow at his pursuers. If I am limited to the short stories, I would choose "The Six Napoleons" for that glimpse into Holmes’s vanity when he receives praise from Lestrade, although I am perhaps prejudiced by Jeremy Brett’s incredible performance in that scene.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Author Jennifer Petkus between her two main inspirations for the <span style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">"</span></span><span style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">A Charlotte House Affair" series</span></span></td></tr>
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<b>IHOSE</b>: Any upcoming projects?</h4>
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<b>JP:</b> I will eventually write the sequel to <i>Our Mutual Friends</i>, completing what’s essentially a trilogy, but my next Holmes/Austen story will be quite different. <i>My Particular Friend</i> and <i>Our Mutual Friends</i> drew inspiration from the characters created by Doyle and Austen, but never actually included those characters by name. My next story will find Holmes solving a case arising from the events immediately after the end of Emma, involving the death of Mrs. Elton. I don’t have a working title for the story, however.</div>
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<b>IHOSE:</b> Any final thoughts?</h4>
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<b>JP:</b> Only that the reason I write is pure self-indulgence. I’m self-published and I really enjoy writing and designing the book. Dreaming up book covers, choosing typefaces and creating characters is the most fun. Actually promoting a book for me, however, is definitely one of the nine circles of hell, so I really appreciate this opportunity to talk about my book without pressure.</div>
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<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Jennifer-Petkus/e/B004W5KYNW" target="_blank">Jennifer Petkus</a> divides her time creating websites for the dead, writing Jane Austen-themed mysteries, woodworking, aikido and building model starships. She has few credentials, having failed to graduate from the University of Texas with a journalism degree, but did manage to find employment at the <i>Colorado Springs Sun</i> newspaper as a cop reporter, copy editor and night city editor before the paper died in 1986. She lives in fear of getting a phone call from her dead Japanese mother. Her husband is the night editor at <i>The Denver Post</i>. Her best friend is a cop. She watched Neil Armstrong walk on the Moon live. You can find her books <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Jennifer-Petkus/e/B004W5KYNW" target="_blank">here</a>.</div>
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<i style="background-color: white; color: #0e0e0e; font-family: "times new roman";"><b>Derrick Belanger</b> is the author of the #1 bestselling book in its category <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="1519511957" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="1519511957" data-amzn-link-id="9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Peculiar Provenance" href="http://www.amazon.com/Sherlock-Holmes-Adventure-Peculiar-Provenance/dp/1519511957/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_3292728" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Peculiar Provenance</a><span style="font-weight: normal;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_3292728" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d&_cb=1451973203084" style="border: none; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>, 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 <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="B017862MVS" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="B017862MVS" data-amzn-link-id="5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="Curse of the Deadly Dinosaur" href="http://www.amazon.com/Deadly-Dinosaur-MacDougall-Sherlock-Holmes-ebook/dp/B017862MVS/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_7842789" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Curse of the Deadly Dinosaur</a><span style="font-weight: normal;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_7842789" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa&_cb=1451973247482" style="border: none; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>, and he edited the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle horror anthology <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="B00P4E8AVI" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="B00P4E8AVI" data-amzn-link-id="a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="A Study in Terror: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Revolutionary Stories of Fear and the Supernatural" href="http://www.amazon.com/Study-Terror-Revolutionary-Stories-Supernatural-ebook/dp/B00P4E8AVI/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_5010397" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">A Study in Terror: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Revolutionary Stories of Fear and the Supernatural</a><span style="font-weight: normal;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_5010397" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a&_cb=1451973259426" style="border: none; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>. Mr. Belanger has recently started the publishing company <a href="http://www.belangerbooks.com/" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Belanger Books</a> which released the Sherlock Holmes anthology <a data-amzn-asin="1533202273" href="https://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Watson-Sherlock-Anthology-Stories/dp/1533202273/" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Beyond Watson</a>. He resides in Colorado and continues compiling unpublished works by Dr. John H. Watson.</i><br />
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What do You Get When You Cross Sherlock Holmes with Jane Austen?

"one other detail was remembered by Jane" [CROO] Jennifer Petkus has added two equal cups of Sherlock Holmes and Jane Au...

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by Belanger Books

The Criminal Mastermind of Baker Street

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<b>"...when a clever man turns his brains to crime..." [SPEC] </b></h4>
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What if Sherlock Holmes had turned his brilliant mind towards crime?  That is the question explored by author Rob Nunn in his exciting new book <u><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Criminal-Mastermind-Baker-Street-ebook/dp/B075RDHN2Z" target="_blank"><i>The Criminal Mastermind of Baker Street</i></a></u>. The book reimagines the entire 60-story Canon through the lens of Sherlock Holmes the master criminal. We interviewed Mr. Nunn, via email, to see what made him made him decide to rewrite this champion of justice as a law breaker.<br />
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<b>I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere:</b> What made you decide to have the cleverest of men turn his brains to crime?</h4>
<b>Rob Nunn (RN):</b> I was rereading “The Greek Interpreter” for the umpteenth time one evening, and Gregson’s line, “It is a mercy that you are on the side of the force, and not against it, Mr. Holmes,” jumped out at me for whatever reason. I started mulling it over in my mind, what if Holmes had worked against the force instead of with it?  What would that look like? From there, I methodically worked my way through the Canon, imagining how each of the sixty stories would play out if Holmes were a criminal instead of a detective. I think I filled half a notebook with notes and speculations before I really had a grasp of what I was getting myself into. This idea had originally started out as a possible article for the <i><a href="http://bakerstreetjournal.com/">Baker Street Journal</a></i>, but I quickly realized that it would adapt itself nicely to a book format.<br />
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<b>IHOSE: </b>Your book covers the entire Canon. How did you organize the stories? Did you have to rearrange some to help with your story arc?</h4>
<b>RN:</b> I modeled my fictional biography off of William Baring-Gould’s <i>Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street</i> and used his chronology exclusively to outline my story arc. Once I had the dates in place, I fleshed out the outline with my notes and figured out where in the chronology other important events such as Holmes telling Watson about his early years and the Ripper murders of London would go. Having the outline of dates really helped keep me from twisting facts to suit theories.<br />
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<b>IHOSE: </b>Which story was the most difficult for you to incorporate in making Holmes a criminal? What made this story uniquely tricky?</h4>
<b>RN:</b> “A Scandal in Bohemia.” I tried a couple of different versions of that story before I settled on a take that I liked.  You have to walk a fine line with the character of Irene Adler. She’s only in one canonical story, but she looms so large in the mind of many readers! One day, I would consider completely writing her off, and over-inflating her role in Holmes’ life the next. There are so many different ways to use that character, but I found a way to keep her role in <i>The Criminal Mastermind of Baker Street</i> very close to the role that Doyle gave her. I was really happy when I finally found an angle to use SCAN that showed Holmes’ criminal cunning while being true to the canonical characters.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Author Rob Nunn at a book signing for <u>The Criminal Mastermind of Baker Street</u></td></tr>
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<b>IHOSE: </b>If you were stranded on a desert island with just one Sherlock Holmes story, which would it be and why?</h4>
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<b>RN: </b><i>The Sign of the Four</i> is my favorite. Starting from the scene with Watson’s watch to the boat chase down the Thames, this is a story that has so many aspects! You get to see Holmes and Watson’s domestic life at 221B, Watson’s only recorded romance, a hidden and then stolen treasure, a murderous pygmy and a vengeful peg-legged man, the Baker Street Irregulars, Holmes being snarky with an inspector, I could go on and on about how much is packed into SIGN. That is definitely my desert island Holmes story.</div>
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<b>IHOSE: </b>You are currently the head of the Program Committee for the <a href="http://beaconsociety.com/">Beacon Society</a>. Tell us a little about what this job entails.</h4>
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<b>RN: </b>The Program Committee proposes education related programs to the Beacon Society board of directors. We also recommend educational resources and activities for the Beacon Society to offer to educators in spreading the word about teaching students about Sherlock Holmes. The program committee is currently assessing the resources we have and looking for other resources to make available at all levels of education. Education never ends, and neither does trying to get students to learn about Holmes!</div>
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<b>IHOSE: </b>Any upcoming projects?</h4>
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<b>RN: </b>I post on my blog, <a href="http://interestingthoughelementary.blogspot.com/">Interesting Though Elementary</a> weekly about Sherlockian topics, so that is an ongoing project that keeps my creative juices flowing.  Chairing a committee for the Beacon Society is also keeping me pretty busy in the Sherlockian world.<br />
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Speaking of Sherlock Holmes and education, I have an essay about teaching Sherlock Holmes to my fifth graders in Chris Redmond’s new <i><a href="http://www.ihearofsherlock.com/2017/11/about-being-sherlockian-its-more-than.html" rel="nofollow">About Being a Sherlockian</a></i> that is out this month and I am part of an upcoming BSI Profession Series book titled <i>Education Never Ends: Educators, Education and the Sherlockian Canon</i> due out in 2020. That seems really far away, but my deadlines for the project aren’t!</div>
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I am head of <a href="http://parallelcasestl.webs.com/">The Parallel Case of St. Louis</a>, and we are just about ready to dedicate a special collection of Sherlockiana at the St. Louis Public Library early next year, so that planning is also underway. I am part of one or two other upcoming Sherlockian projects, but I haven’t been told that I can announce them publicly yet.  </div>
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<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Criminal-Mastermind-Baker-Street-ebook/dp/B075RDHN2Z"><img border="0" data-original-height="960" data-original-width="639" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsSyeFrvFgchzz5-huU5xxJOdISep-5h4eoBXVB8ych42xOz36N3jwvJ4h-cU8rsS-URS8qeUqejw0j6KsOkbrpV7sqU6SsaIa0QhM5cbyt5P4l33qB60G1vneQ9_NiE4eoUU_a_fKXuVv/s400/Nunn+-+Criminal+Mastermind.jpg" width="266" /></a></div>
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<i>Rob Nunn is the author of <u><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Criminal-Mastermind-Baker-Street-ebook/dp/B075RDHN2Z" target="_blank">The Criminal Mastermind of Baker Street</a></u> and shares his thoughts on Sherlockiana at <a href="http://interestingthoughelementary.blogspost.com/" target="_blank">Interesting Though Elementary</a>. He lives in Edwardsville, IL with his wife and daughter. There he teaches fifth grade and enjoys reading and watching baseball in his spare time.</i></div>
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<br /><i>Derrick Belanger is the author of the #1 bestselling book in its category <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Sherlock-Holmes-Adventure-Peculiar-Provenance/dp/1519511957/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d&linkCode=ktl">Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Peculiar Provenance</a><img border="0" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d&_cb=1451973203084" />, 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 <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Deadly-Dinosaur-MacDougall-Sherlock-Holmes-ebook/dp/B017862MVS/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa&linkCode=ktl">Curse of the Deadly Dinosaur</a><img border="0" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa&_cb=1451973247482" />, and he edited the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle horror anthology <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Study-Terror-Revolutionary-Stories-Supernatural-ebook/dp/B00P4E8AVI/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a&linkCode=ktl">A Study in Terror: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Revolutionary Stories of Fear and the Supernatural</a><img border="0" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a&_cb=1451973259426" />. Mr. Belanger has recently started the publishing company <a href="http://www.belangerbooks.com/">Belanger Books</a> which released the Sherlock Holmes anthology <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Watson-Sherlock-Anthology-Stories/dp/1533202273/">Beyond Watson</a>. He resides in Colorado and continues compiling unpublished works by Dr. John H. Watson.</i><br /><br /><div>
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The Criminal Mastermind of Baker Street

"...when a clever man turns his brains to crime..." [SPEC] What if Sherlock Holmes had turned his brilliant mind towards c...

+ Read more »

by Belanger Books

Sherlock Holmes: Adventures in the Realms of H.G. Wells

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<b>"...the scientific use of the imagination." </b>[HOUN]</h4>
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Imagine Sherlock Holmes trying to solve the case of an invisible man attacking London, matching wits with a traveler from out of time, tracking down a human / feline hybrid, or using his deductive skills to help fight Martian and lunar invaders! These are just some of the stories included in the new anthology <b><a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1306925656/sherlock-holmes-in-the-realms-of-hg-wells-antholog" target="_blank"><i>Sherlock Holmes: Adventures in the Realms of H.G. Wells</i></a>.  </b>The anthology is currently  available at a discount via a <a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1306925656/sherlock-holmes-in-the-realms-of-hg-wells-antholog" target="_blank">Kickstarter</a> campaign.<br />
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We interviewed some of the authors to learn a bit about their contribution to this interesting anthology. We asked each of them the same four questions:</div>
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<li>Please tell us a little bit about your story without giving too much away.</li>
<li>Which Wells story or stories do you connect to your Sherlock Holmes narrative? Why did you choose that story/ those stories?</li>
<li>Why did you want to participate in this project?</li>
<li>What are your current and upcoming projects?</li>
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<b>Katie Magnussen </b></h3>
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<b>1.</b> Sherlock Holmes has just come back from pretending to be dead, and is bored. Really bored. So bored that he doesn't hesitate to drag Watson into a travelling freak show while they're out for a walk. They see a bizarre creature in a cage, one whose escape happens to coincide with a string of savage deaths in the area. In order to stop the killings, Holmes has to discover the creature's origins.</div>
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<b>2.</b> The idea for the story comes from <i>The Island of Dr. Moreau</i>. I wanted to write something a little different, a little bizarre, and my mind instantly went to Moreau. It's delightfully terrifying, and almost all of the horror comes from the humans rather than the "monsters." The problem with a Moreau-based story was that I was not comfortable using Holmes as a stand-in for the protagonist, or somehow putting Holmes and/or Watson on the island, but I loved the idea of Sherlock Holmes tackling the ideas of that novel, and so instead of putting Holmes on the island, I brought the island to Holmes. I tried to give the same attention to the horrors of mankind as Wells did in his story, but tempered down to a more Doylean attitude, plus a healthy dose of good-old Watson optimism.</div>
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<b>3.</b> I've always loved crossover Sherlockiana. Put Holmes in the future, in the past, on another planet, meeting any figure of literature or history you can think of, and I'll read it. That doesn't mean I'll like it, I do have standards, but I'll certainly read it at least once. When presented with the opportunity to participate with a collection of tales combining the greatest detective with one of the fathers of science fiction, how could I say no?</div>
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<b>4.</b> I'm currently working on the third book of my sci-fi mystery series "The Adventures of Watts and Sherlock," following the lives of a doctor and a detective solving crimes in a bleak futuristic world. The first two books are available in ebook and print formats on <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Katie-Magnusson/e/B01FWXYFWI" target="_blank">Amazon</a>, and hopefully the third will join them before Christmas. Anyone interested can visit <a href="http://www.wattsandsherlock.com/">www.wattsandsherlock.com</a> or <a href="http://facebook.com/WattsandSherlock">facebook.com/WattsandSherlock</a> for updates!</div>
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<b>John Linwood Grant</b></h3>
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<b>1.</b> If you’re a lover of the Holmes canon, then you should recognize Holmes’s return to Upper Swandam Lane, scene of "The Man with the Twisted Lip." When the moon shines down on the spread of a new and insidious drug throughout central London, Holmes, Watson and Special Branch must identify not only the killers of a respectable Chinese merchant, but the true origin of the "red opium" and make some difficult decisions about what to believe when they encounter a very troubled man.</div>
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<b>2.</b> I wanted something as canonical as it could be and yet still be a definite tribute to H.G. Wells’s science fiction. So I crossed the Wells/Doyle wires and chose a relatively minor aspect of <i>The First Men in the Moon</i> as my spark. I should pretend to be literary, but have a nasty feeling that I might have been influenced by seeing Lionel Jeffries in the dubious film adaptation of <i>First Men </i>when I was a child.</div>
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<b>3.</b> I suppose I simply like the work of both authors, having grown up with them. Also, rather than utterly rework Holmes, in cases like this I do enjoy sliding him just a touch outside of his original zone, enough to open up possibilities but not absolute certainties. This seemed a great opportunity to tease again.</div>
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<b>4.</b>  Currently I’m promoting my recent collection of strange Edwardian-based stories, <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Persistence-Geraniums-Other-Worrying-Tales/dp/1976108926">A Persistence of Geraniums and Other Worrying Tales</a></i> — murder, madness, and the supernatural — and plotting out a much longer work featuring my recurring character Mr. Dry, the feared Deptford Assassin. I’m also editing <i><a href="http://greydogtales.com/blog/occult-detective-quarterly/odq/">Occult Detective Quarterly</a></i> magazine as usual, and will soon be editing a new anthology called <i>Hell’s Empire</i> which you might consider a demonic version of Wells’s <i>War of the Worlds</i>. Rather appropriate, really.</div>
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<b>Daniel D. Victor</b></h3>
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<b>1. </b>The ambiguous ending to the original version of H.G. Wells’ story, “The Country of the Blind,” merely hints at a positive outcome. We never learn whether the protagonist successfully escapes from an isolated land where everyone is blind. Despite his love for a blind woman and his early belief that “in the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king,” his plans to gain power go awry.  Once the village elders decide to put out his eyes, those strange growths on his face deemed responsible for his maddening references to something called “sight,” he concludes it’s time to flee. My story, “An Adventure in Darkness,” explains how the protagonist successfully returns to London where, to recreate his previous experience, he marries a beautiful blind woman. When violence threatens the relationship, Holmes and Watson are called in to set matters right.</div>
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<b>2.</b> I chose “The Country of the Blind” as my starting point for two reasons. First, I think it’s an exquisite story, a fantasy that readers can relate to on a literal level.  In a similar situation, wouldn’t most sighted people attempt to assert authority over those who cannot see? In fact, the set up seems typical of any situation in which an individual—however wrongly—feels stronger than everyone else.  Second, though a fable of sorts, the story takes place in a believable setting, one that doesn’t clash with the realistic world of Sherlock Holmes. Even in today’s real world, we occasionally learn of the discovery of an isolated community. Who’s not to say that hidden in the mountains of Ecuador, as in Wells' story, or somewhere else there really does live a group of blind people cut off from the rest of humanity? </div>
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<b>3.</b>  For as long as I can remember, I’ve always been a fan of H.G. Wells. In graduate school I wrote a long, analytical paper about him called “Of Science Romances and Utopian Dreams.” (As a college freshman, I wrote a paper on Sherlock Holmes.) I've gone so far as to feature Wells as a character in my Holmes pastiche, “The Baron of Brede Place,” which is about Wells’ friend, writer Stephen Crane; and I have Wells reappear in “An Adventure in Darkness.” </div>
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<b>4.</b> I’m currently working on two distinctly different novels. One, a mystery, links Sherlock Holmes to the fiction of Fyodor Dostoyevsky. The other, a more contemporary piece, dramatizes significant events in my forty-six years of public school teaching. Together, the projects comprise two major academic interests of mine, literature and education.<br />
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To learn more about Sherlock Holmes: Adventures in the Realms of H.G. Wells, <a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1306925656/sherlock-holmes-in-the-realms-of-hg-wells-antholog">go to the Kickstarter page here</a>.  You can back the project until November 18th.<br />
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<i style="background-color: white; color: #0e0e0e; font-family: "times new roman";"><b>Derrick Belanger</b> is the author of the #1 bestselling book in its category <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="1519511957" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="1519511957" data-amzn-link-id="9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Peculiar Provenance" href="http://www.amazon.com/Sherlock-Holmes-Adventure-Peculiar-Provenance/dp/1519511957/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_3292728" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Peculiar Provenance</a><span style="font-weight: normal;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_3292728" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d&_cb=1451973203084" style="border: none; cursor: move; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>, 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 <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="B017862MVS" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="B017862MVS" data-amzn-link-id="5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="Curse of the Deadly Dinosaur" href="http://www.amazon.com/Deadly-Dinosaur-MacDougall-Sherlock-Holmes-ebook/dp/B017862MVS/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_7842789" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Curse of the Deadly Dinosaur</a><span style="font-weight: normal;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_7842789" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa&_cb=1451973247482" style="border: none; cursor: move; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>, and he edited the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle horror anthology <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="B00P4E8AVI" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="B00P4E8AVI" data-amzn-link-id="a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="A Study in Terror: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Revolutionary Stories of Fear and the Supernatural" href="http://www.amazon.com/Study-Terror-Revolutionary-Stories-Supernatural-ebook/dp/B00P4E8AVI/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_5010397" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">A Study in Terror: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Revolutionary Stories of Fear and the Supernatural</a><span style="font-weight: normal;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_5010397" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a&_cb=1451973259426" style="border: none; cursor: move; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>. Mr. Belanger has recently started the publishing company <a href="http://www.belangerbooks.com/" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Belanger Books</a> which released the Sherlock Holmes anthology <a data-amzn-asin="1533202273" href="https://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Watson-Sherlock-Anthology-Stories/dp/1533202273/" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Beyond Watson</a>. He resides in Colorado and continues compiling unpublished works by Dr. John H. Watson.</i><br />
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Sherlock Holmes: Adventures in the Realms of H.G. Wells

"...the scientific use of the imagination." [HOUN] Imagine Sherlock Holmes trying to solve the case of an invisible man att...

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by Belanger Books

Interview with David Marcum on Sherlock Holmes: Before Baker Street

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"before my biographer had come to glorify me" [MUSG] </h4>
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Sherlockian editor and author David Marcum is always involved in multiple Sherlock Holmes projects. He just released the highly successful two volume anthology <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Holmes-Away-Adventures-Great-Hiatus-ebook/dp/B01MRU43BB" target="_blank"><i>Holmes Away From Home: Tales of the Great Hiatus</i></a>, and the sixth volume of his legendary <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Book-New-Sherlock-Holmes-Stories/dp/1787050874" target="_blank"><i>The MX book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories</i></a> will be released on May 22nd. Between these two anthologies, Mr. Marcum decided to go back to the early days of Sherlock Holmes and edit the anthology <a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1306925656/sherlock-holmes-before-baker-street" target="_blank"><i>Sherlock Holmes: Before Baker Street</i></a> which is currently being funded via a <a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1306925656/sherlock-holmes-before-baker-street">Kickstarter campaign</a>.<br />
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We asked David about the days of Sherlock Holmes before he met his Boswell.<br />
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<b>I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere: Holmes and Baker Street seem inseparable. Why set a story collection outside of 221B Baker Street?</b></h4>
<b>David Marcum:</b> The simple answer is that there is so much more to the story of Sherlock Holmes than what occurs during the Baker Street years, or what is presented in the pitifully few 60 stories of the original Canon.<br />
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I play The Game with deadly seriousness. The Game postulates that Holmes and Watson were real historical figures. Being real, they had childhoods and old ages in addition to those other more famous times of their lives that spring so easily to mind. Having read and collected and chronologized literally thousands of traditional Holmes adventures over the last 40+ years, I’ve seen all parts of Holmes's and Watson’s lives chronicled – youth and old age. For instance, there are stories that are set in the 1840s, where Holmes’s parents meet and marry. Many tales show incidents in their boyhoods and on into young adulthood. These only help to add to the rounded picture of our heroes. There was a lot of living and learning that went on for both Holmes and Watson before they first met in that lab at Barts on January 1st, 1881, when they were 26 (almost 27) and 28-½  years old, respectively.<br />
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There can never be enough new Holmes stories, but it certainly doesn’t hurt to fill in the cracks in certain areas, such as reading about what happened before Baker Street.<br />
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<b>IHOSE:</b> <b>You’ve written extensively about Holmes’s residence in Montague Street, his lodgings just before moving into Baker Street. What are some interesting characteristics about this time and place in Holmes’s life? How does this setting come into play in some of the Before Baker Street stories?</b></h4>
<b>DM: </b>Many of the stories in <a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1306925656/sherlock-holmes-before-baker-street" target="_blank"><i>Sherlock Holmes: Before Baker Street</i></a> are set in Montague Street, and we see Holmes acting with confidence, but sometimes with a lot still left to learn. Personally, I’m fascinated with this time in Holmes’s life, when he was in the process of becoming the individual that’s admired the world over. On all three of my Holmes Pilgrimages to London (and other parts of England), I’ve visited Holmes’s lodgings at No. 24 Montague Street, and on the second and third Pilgrimages, I was even fortunate enough to stay there, as it’s now part of a small hotel.<br />
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Holmes explains in “The Musgrave Ritual” that, before he moved to the more famous Baker Street, he settled in Montague Street, next to the British Museum, where he set about learning his craft. This was the time when Holmes had come up to London to create a new profession, that of a Consulting Detective. Before that, he had been a university student, likely preparing for a conventional career. (Famed Holmes biographer William S. Baring-Gould indicated that Holmes’s father wanted him to be an engineer.) Although he’d had numerous adventures growing up and while at school, as chronicled in various narratives, Holmes hadn’t really considered becoming a detective professionally until the events of “The Gloria Scott”.<br />
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Following his decision, he dived in wholeheartedly and began to educate himself in those aspects that he thought would be useful. However, he was still quite unknown and somewhat inexperienced in those days, and not the knowledgeable and world-famous Holmes that would later state, “There is a strong family resemblance about misdeeds, and if you have all the details of a thousand at your finger ends, it is odd if you can’t unravel the thousand-and-first.” This was the period of time when Holmes was accumulating those thousand details at his finger ends.<br />
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<b>IHOSE: How far back in time do the Before Baker Street stories go? Any tales about Holmes as a child or young adult?  </b></h4>
<b>DM: </b>This collection begins in 1862, when Holmes is eight years old, in a story by Jayantika Ganguly called “The Adventure of the Bloody Roses.” We see, even then, that Holmes has some amazing observational skills, and we also get a look at fifteen-year-old Mycroft, giving indications of the man that he would become. Also, this story shows a wonderful connection between the two brothers.<br />
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The stories proceed chronologically throughout the book, with Holmes at university and then when he’s moved to Montague Street. The adventures continue through the 1870’s, including a trip to America when Holmes was an actor with the Sasanoff acting company, a part of Holmes’s early life originally revealed in Baring-Gould’s biography of Holmes, and later explored over the years by other “editors” of Watson’s notes. Finally, the book ends with a pair of stories set in 1880, leading to Holmes’s fortuitous meeting with Dr. Watson at Barts, and his subsequent move to Baker Street.<br />
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<b>IHOSE: Is Watson completely absent from the collection?</b></h4>
<b>DM:</b> Holmes once said to Watson, “I am lost without my Boswell.” As the keeper of the Archives, Watson has access to the records of many of Holmes’s cases, both those in which he participated, and the ones that he didn’t. This includes the adventures that Holmes had before Baker Street. Therefore, there’s no way that Watson could be absent from this collection.<br />
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In this volume, there are a few stories that don’t involve Watson at all, either narrated by someone who encountered Holmes and chronicled the events in his own words, or some told in third person. However, Watson appears in most of these narratives, as he is told about this or that past case by Holmes. Thankfully Watson preserved all of these pre-Baker Street adventures in his tin despatch-box.<br />
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<b>IHOSE: What new insights will readers learn about Holmes from these stories?</b></h4>
<b>DM:</b> This collection won’t show Holmes doing anything that is unexpected. There are no stories where he is secretly a wizard or a time-traveler or a criminal or Professor Moriarty’s son. He’s still Sherlock Holmes – possibly a little less skilled about what he’s doing, and certainly not as respected yet by Scotland Yard. But it’s easy to see that he’s on the path to become the Sherlock Holmes that is loved and admired around the world.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">David Marcum standing in front of the painting at No. 24 Montague street used in his <a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1306925656/sherlock-holmes-before-baker-street" target="_blank">Sherlock Holmes: Before Baker Street</a> story "The Painting in the Parlour"</span></td></tr>
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<b>IHOSE:  You always seem to be working on a multitude of projects. What can we expect to see from you in the near future?  </b></h4>
<b>DM:</b> I’ve found the calm in the eye of the storm that lets me balance a lot of things right now, and hopefully that will last for a while. In addition to spending time with my family and work as a civil engineer, I’m involved in various Holmesian projects that continue to fulfill my interest in supporting the true Sherlock Holmes.<br />
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I’m continuing to edit the MX anthologies, and the upcoming volume, <i><b>The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories – Part VI: 2017 Annual</b></i>, will be published on May 22nd, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s birthday. The next three volumes after that are already planned out, and amazingly I’m receiving a sizable number of stories for all of them. (The next, <i>Part VII: Eliminate the Impossible</i>, will be out in Fall 2017, <i>Part VIII: 2018 Annual</i> in Spring 2018, and <i>Part IX: Some Untold Cases</i> in Fall 2018.) The author royalties continue to go to support the Stepping Stones School at Undershaw, one of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s former homes, and to this point we’ve raised around $20,000.<br />
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In addition to those books, I’m involved in editing another Holmes collection of a different sort, and I’ve also written a still-secret and very exciting Holmes-related project – both of which I can’t discuss further at this point, except to say that I’m very happy to be involved with each of them. Finally, I’m working on a new Holmes novel and various short stories for different anthologies, with an eye towards collecting all of these loose tales from the past few years into a new short story collection.<br />
<br />
As always, thank you very much for the opportunity to be interviewed, and special thanks to all the authors who have contributed to this and other projects, helping make it all possible. Sherlockians – and especially these Sherlockians! – are absolutely the best people!<br />
<br />
<br />
For more on David Marcum, visit his <a href="http://17stepprogram.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">blog</a> and <a href="https://www.amazon.com/David-Marcum/e/B00K1IKA92" target="_blank">Amazon page</a>. You can back <i><a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1306925656/sherlock-holmes-before-baker-street" target="_blank">Sherlock Holmes: Before Baker Street</a></i> on Kickstarter until April 24th.<br />
<br />
<br />
<i style="background-color: white; color: #0e0e0e; font-family: "times new roman";">Derrick Belanger is the author of the #1 bestselling book in its category <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="1519511957" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="1519511957" data-amzn-link-id="9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Peculiar Provenance" href="http://www.amazon.com/Sherlock-Holmes-Adventure-Peculiar-Provenance/dp/1519511957/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_3292728" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Peculiar Provenance</a><span style="border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-width: initial;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_3292728" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d&_cb=1451973203084" style="border: none; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>, 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 <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="B017862MVS" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="B017862MVS" data-amzn-link-id="5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="Curse of the Deadly Dinosaur" href="http://www.amazon.com/Deadly-Dinosaur-MacDougall-Sherlock-Holmes-ebook/dp/B017862MVS/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_7842789" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Curse of the Deadly Dinosaur</a><span style="border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-width: initial;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_7842789" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa&_cb=1451973247482" style="border: none; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>, and he edited the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle horror anthology <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="B00P4E8AVI" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="B00P4E8AVI" data-amzn-link-id="a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="A Study in Terror: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Revolutionary Stories of Fear and the Supernatural" href="http://www.amazon.com/Study-Terror-Revolutionary-Stories-Supernatural-ebook/dp/B00P4E8AVI/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_5010397" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">A Study in Terror: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Revolutionary Stories of Fear and the Supernatural</a><span style="border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-width: initial;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_5010397" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a&_cb=1451973259426" style="border: none; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>. Mr. Belanger has recently started the publishing company <a href="http://www.belangerbooks.com/" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Belanger Books</a> which released the Sherlock Holmes anthology <a data-amzn-asin="1533202273" href="https://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Watson-Sherlock-Anthology-Stories/dp/1533202273/" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Beyond Watson</a>. He resides in Colorado and continues compiling unpublished works by Dr. John H. Watson.</i><br />
<div>
<br /></div>

Interview with David Marcum on Sherlock Holmes: Before Baker Street

"before my biographer had come to glorify me" [MUSG] Sherlockian editor and author David Marcum is always involved in m...

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by Belanger Books

Review — An Improbable Truth: The Paranormal Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

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"It seems most improbable" [BRUC] </h4>
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<br />
Holmes and the paranormal may at first seem a bridge too far. The rational detective always found a solution to his mysteries grounded in the real world, and as he famously stated in "The Sussex Vampire" when faced with a possible case of vampirism, "No ghosts need apply."<br />
<br />
Yet below the surface of some of Doyle's work, one can see some cases with not so logical conclusions. Take, for example, these unfinished tales mentioned in "The Problem of Thor Bridge":<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"Among these unfinished tales is that of Mr. James Phillimore, who, stepping back into his own house to get his umbrella, was never more seen in this world. No less remarkable is that of the cutter Alicia, which sailed one spring morning into a small patch of mist from where she never again emerged, nor was anything further ever heard of herself and her crew. A third case worthy of note is that of Isadora Persano, the well-known journalist and duellist, who was found stark staring mad with a match box in front of him which contained a remarkable worm said to be unknown to science." </blockquote>
Men and women disappearing into thin air may have some logical explanation...or not. And a worm which drives people insane seems to come straight from science fiction.<br />
<br />
I mention the above to give credit to A.C. Thompson, the editor of  <a href="http://mochamemoirspress.com/spookylock/" target="_blank"><i>An Improbable Truth: The Paranormal Adventures of Sherlock Holmes</i></a> for finding an excellent balance of paranormal stories which range from those with logical conclusions to those with monsters from other worlds, and most which fall somewhere in the middle. Take for example Lucy Blue's "The Fairy Pool," a story in which a girl goes missing in the Lake District. What starts out as a straightforward case delves into the realm of magic, or does it? This author does an excellent job keeping the reader guessing.<br />
<br />
Then there is "Sherlock Holmes and the Hungry Ghost," written by the wonderfully talented young Sherlock Holmes author Katie Magnusson. Ms. Magnusson, even when she delves into Holmes cyberpunk, always stays close to the Canon in her approach to Holmes. This tale is the most traditional story in the collection, and I believe strict canonical Holmesians will find it to be the best.<br />
<br />
The story I personally found to be the best in the collection was "The Arendall Horror," by Thomas Olbert. This story involves a young Miss Corbett who seeks Holmes help in fending off a demonic attacker. The story grows in its complexity, and by the end I found it to be downright terrifying. This story does the best job of balancing the traditional Holmes mysteries with the horrors of paranormal monstrosities. Both Doyle and H.P. Lovecraft would be proud.<br />
<br />
Other standout stories in the collection include the humorous "The Diamond Carter Ghost" by Matthew Wilson. In this story Holmes uses his boxing skills to take on an opponent with supernatural powers. In "The Canaries of Clee Hill Mines" by Robert Perret, Holmes and Watson investigate the disappearance of three men. Holmes believes it will be fun to identify an underground murderer, but the case does not develop in the way he predicts. Finally, we cannot have a paranormal collection today without having at least one story involving zombies, and we get tat from Trenton Mabey's "The Case of the Rising Dead."<br />
<br />
Overall, this is a fun and exciting collection of stories perfect for the Halloween season. I do have to add one disclaimer. The editor does start her introduction by stating "I am NOT a devout Sherlockian." Beyond the fact that this book involves the paranormal, it also has many stories in which Watson calls Holmes "Sherlock" and Holmes calls Watson "John." For some purists, that will be hard to swallow. If you are open to different takes on the Holmes and Watson relationship and certainly, if you are a fan of the BBC Sherlock series, you should be able to see past the disclaimer and enjoy these stories. Just make sure you don't read them in the dark!<br />
<br />
<b><i>An Improbable Truth: The Paranormal Adventures of Sherlock Holmes</i></b> is available from <a href="http://mochamemoirspress.com/spookylock/" target="_blank">Mocha Memoir Press</a> and <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Improbable-Truth-Paranormal-Adventures-Sherlock/dp/0984004262" target="_blank">Amazon</a>.<br />
<br />
<i style="background-color: white; color: #0e0e0e; font-family: "times new roman";">Derrick Belanger is the author of the #1 bestselling book in its category <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="1519511957" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="1519511957" data-amzn-link-id="9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Peculiar Provenance" href="http://www.amazon.com/Sherlock-Holmes-Adventure-Peculiar-Provenance/dp/1519511957/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_3292728" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Peculiar Provenance</a><span style="border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-width: initial;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_3292728" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d&_cb=1451973203084" style="border: none; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>, 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 <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="B017862MVS" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="B017862MVS" data-amzn-link-id="5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="Curse of the Deadly Dinosaur" href="http://www.amazon.com/Deadly-Dinosaur-MacDougall-Sherlock-Holmes-ebook/dp/B017862MVS/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_7842789" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Curse of the Deadly Dinosaur</a><span style="border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-width: initial;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_7842789" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa&_cb=1451973247482" style="border: none; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>, and he edited the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle horror anthology <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="B00P4E8AVI" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="B00P4E8AVI" data-amzn-link-id="a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="A Study in Terror: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Revolutionary Stories of Fear and the Supernatural" href="http://www.amazon.com/Study-Terror-Revolutionary-Stories-Supernatural-ebook/dp/B00P4E8AVI/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_5010397" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">A Study in Terror: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Revolutionary Stories of Fear and the Supernatural</a><span style="border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-width: initial;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_5010397" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a&_cb=1451973259426" style="border: none; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>. Mr. Belanger has recently started the publishing company <a href="http://www.belangerbooks.com/" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Belanger Books</a> which released the Sherlock Holmes anthology <a data-amzn-asin="1533202273" href="https://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Watson-Sherlock-Anthology-Stories/dp/1533202273/" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Beyond Watson</a>. He resides in Colorado and continues compiling unpublished works by Dr. John H. Watson.</i><br />
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<i style="background-color: white; color: #0e0e0e; font-family: "times new roman";">--</i><br />
<i style="background-color: white; color: #0e0e0e; font-family: "times new roman";"><br /></i>

Review — An Improbable Truth: The Paranormal Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

"It seems most improbable" [BRUC] Holmes and the paranormal may at first seem a bridge too far. The rational detective alway...

+ Read more »

by Belanger Books

Holmes Away From Home: Tales From the Great Hiatus

<h4 style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
"had finally been called away" [BLUE]</h4>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">"The Great Hiatus!" Those three words conjure wonderful and powerful images in the minds of all Sherlockians," writes author and editor David Marcum in <a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1306925656/holmes-away-from-home-adventures-from-the-great-hi" target="_blank"><i>Holmes Away From Home: Tales From the Great Hiatus</i></a>, a two volume collection of stories where authors speculate on the whereabouts of Holmes from Reichenbach Day, May 4th 1891 til his return on April 5th, 1894. While Doyle did give us a somewhat brief explanation of Holmes's activities during those missing three years, it has been up to fans of the great detective to fill in the gaps.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">In "The Adventure of the Empty House," Holmes explains to Watson how he spent his time after surviving his fight with Professor Moriarty:</span><br />

<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">"I travelled for two years in Tibet, therefore, and amused myself by visiting Lhassa, and spending some days with the head Llama. You may have read of the remarkable explorations of a Norwegian named Sigerson, but I am sure that it never occurred to you that you were receiving news of your friend. I then passed through Persia, looked in at Mecca, and paid a short but interesting visit to the Khalifa at Khartoum, the results of which I have communicated to the Foreign Office. Returning to France, I spent some months in a research into the coal-tar derivatives, which I conducted in a laboratory at Montpellier, in the South of France." </span></blockquote>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOM7fZfJ6M5KbyAu_7bR8djay0a3_9FGlmybFJPY_kvSA60-Wkv_2g4nh2zviia3ArglKZAcAwSZXn0MrItznlzLNXhdvUDyEG9FMDHkAvUCzZj6xMzL5MH1HeNi-YYLS-bxO_Uhz9htmP/s1600/Great+Hiatus.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOM7fZfJ6M5KbyAu_7bR8djay0a3_9FGlmybFJPY_kvSA60-Wkv_2g4nh2zviia3ArglKZAcAwSZXn0MrItznlzLNXhdvUDyEG9FMDHkAvUCzZj6xMzL5MH1HeNi-YYLS-bxO_Uhz9htmP/s400/Great+Hiatus.jpg" width="265" /></a></td></tr>
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Holmes then returns to London. But is that all there is to the story?  A paragraph seems an awfully brief way to sum up the whereabouts of the great detective for three years of his life. This "was a period of nearly three whole years, from May 1891 to April 1894 – that’s over a thousand days! The tiny amount of information related in “The Empty House” is clearly not the whole story," argues Marcum in the <a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1306925656/holmes-away-from-home-adventures-from-the-great-hi" target="_blank"><i>Holmes Away from Hom</i>e</a> introduction. This argument led to the two volume anthology.<br />
<br />
<br />
Where was Holmes during those missing years?<br />
<br />
There is a general consensus among pastiche writers. After his victory at the Reichenbach Falls, Holmes returns to London briefly in disguise, then travels to Europe, takes passage by sea to India, and spends the winter in Tibet. Holmes leaves Tibet in the spring of 1892 until his return to London in 1894, Holmes spends his time on secret missions guided by his brother. These missions take Holmes to the Middle and Far East, to the North American continent, and then back to Europe.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhfc-PotYrkXmJn9w1TaxdkJ6ODlP9KQPcyXyaRc3eNjygLzhR0cQtjxswFfu33tsDogkqluODRdntHdtT4Lv5ZbbR_LedfR0XSc45k5YnUa7EvOP70ONTUt4FN0I1WUfrr_MSrwPC6ecB/s1600/Great+Hiatus+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhfc-PotYrkXmJn9w1TaxdkJ6ODlP9KQPcyXyaRc3eNjygLzhR0cQtjxswFfu33tsDogkqluODRdntHdtT4Lv5ZbbR_LedfR0XSc45k5YnUa7EvOP70ONTUt4FN0I1WUfrr_MSrwPC6ecB/s400/Great+Hiatus+2.jpg" width="265" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cover to Holmes Away From Home Volume 2</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
If this consensus already exists then why the need for a new Hiatus collection? Editor David Marcum himself shares his logic:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"The most important reason is that there can never be enough traditional Sherlock Holmes adventures. We find out some more about what Holmes did in Europe before he set out for Tibet, and how Watson filled some of his time back in London. Details of Holmes’s missions in India and traveling in the Middle East are revealed, some with long-reaching consequences. Details of more than one trip to the United States are addressed, with visits to places that have previously been unidentified in Holmes’s itinerary. Finally, we learn what he was doing in the days and even hours leading up to the events of 'The Empty House.' If you’ve already journeyed with Holmes on some of his Hiatus investigations, you’ll appreciate the chance to do so again. And if this is your first time setting out on the journey with him, you couldn’t be in better hands."</blockquote>
<br />
<a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1306925656/holmes-away-from-home-adventures-from-the-great-hi" target="_blank"><i>Holmes Away From Home</i></a> is a <a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1306925656/holmes-away-from-home-adventures-from-the-great-hi" target="_blank">Kickstarter</a>-backed project, open until November 25th.<br />
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Holmes Away From Home: Tales From the Great Hiatus

"had finally been called away" [BLUE] "The Great Hiatus!" Those three words conjure wonderful and powerful images i...

+ Read more »

by Belanger Books

Welcome to Undershaw — An Interview with Luke Kuhns

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<h4 style="text-align: center;">
"the high, thin window of old stained glass, the oak panelling" [HOUN]</h4>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEOfMBfHHcy_-dVyVE20JZVirn2zKRioWCfBeP7KT_S3Ii4P9gOoeB9QY8Bh9bsf2uukV_GK50mDuTyzu85g-Ql1PlRrcoNTgLZlr00maGTaKjbae0CHC1js26uIrhsNjjNxLcXMuqyU56/s1600/Undershaw+stained+glass.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="332" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEOfMBfHHcy_-dVyVE20JZVirn2zKRioWCfBeP7KT_S3Ii4P9gOoeB9QY8Bh9bsf2uukV_GK50mDuTyzu85g-Ql1PlRrcoNTgLZlr00maGTaKjbae0CHC1js26uIrhsNjjNxLcXMuqyU56/s640/Undershaw+stained+glass.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://www.ihearofsherlock.com/search/label/Undershaw" target="_blank">Since 2010</a>, loyal Doyleans and passionate historians have been working feverishly to save and restore Undershaw. In 2014, the former estate was purchased by the DFN Foundation which has been working to both restore Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's study to its original splendor and also to use the property to house Stepping Stones, a school for special needs students. In September 2016, Stepping Stones school officially opened, and the public got their first view of Doyle's restored study.<br />
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One person who attended the grand opening was Luke B. Kuhns, author and scholar, whose book about Doyle's history at Undershaw, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Welcome-Undershaw-History-Created-Sherlock/dp/1787050211/" target="_blank"><i>Welcome to Undershaw - A Brief History of Arthur Conan Doyle: The Man Who Created Sherlock Holmes</i></a>, was released on October 10th. We interviewed Mr. Kuhns via email about his Undershaw book, the grand opening, and his other Sherlockian work.<br />
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<h4>
<b>I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere:</b> The Stepping Stones school just recently opened at Undershaw, and you were at the ceremony. Tell us what it was like to see the restored Undershaw for the first time as well as what it was like to see the school portion of the estate.</h4>
<b>Luke Kuhns (LK):</b> It was incredible to see Undershaw alive. To see lights on, people walking in and out, it just felt alive. Finally. What DFN has done is remarkable. I know it cost them a lot more than originally planned, but they spared no expense, to quote John Hammond! The house is beautifully restored. I am very pleased with the extension as well. Rightfully it is architecturally different from Undershaw to show people what the house was in the past and what is new. The addition is beautiful and open and classy. One can turn and look back at Undersaw with reverence.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtOERKDIGpCsI4SCatRdSgaRxw74rr6WT8RryuzR1ZyUjHb4IRG7nbi9xBZ1d69nmRlP7t0nfoK2n8lZT4Z-OjsbhmFScLhyVJFyRrimpeqT6PmBCPW9mgEVbUZI74N3W3Axoc6Y5S2BaJ/s1600/Undershaw+opening+gala.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtOERKDIGpCsI4SCatRdSgaRxw74rr6WT8RryuzR1ZyUjHb4IRG7nbi9xBZ1d69nmRlP7t0nfoK2n8lZT4Z-OjsbhmFScLhyVJFyRrimpeqT6PmBCPW9mgEVbUZI74N3W3Axoc6Y5S2BaJ/s640/Undershaw+opening+gala.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Undershaw during the opening night gala</td></tr>
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<h4>
<b>IHOSE: </b> Your new book <i>Welcome to Undershaw</i> is a biography of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in relation to his time spent at Undershaw. Tell us about the book. How did you conduct your research? What makes this biography unique?</h4>
<b>LK:</b> I really felt to tell Undershaw's story we needed to know Conan Doyle's story. So the book begins with a look at his grandfather, father, and mother; then him. I explore his life from childhood through to his departure at Undershaw. Research was a mixture of reading many many books, visiting libraries in Portsmouth and London as well as rare book collectors, and spending time in Hindhead. It was very detailed and thorough, and I enjoyed every moment of it.<br />
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What makes it unique? Good question! I loved John Dickson Carr's biography...it read like a story. Plenty of Doyle biographies just say "on this date he did this...on this date he did that" and I found it painfully boring. There's a lot he did that is incredibly interesting, and there's a lot he did that is incredibly not interesting...I don't necessarily care who he had dinner with on a particular date! HA! So what I wanted to show people is that Sir Arthur was more than just the writer of Sherlock Holmes stories and <i>The White Company</i>. I explored his life through his writings starting all the way back in his childhood, and art the flows in his family's blood. Yes, all the biographies tell you about his writing, but looking at his life as an accomplished writer first rather than Doctor or anything else, you begin to see how his writing is impacting his daily life and vice versa.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">First editions of some of Doyle's most famous work located on the shelf in the headmaster's office<br />
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<b>IHOSE: </b>You recently had a story published in <a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01GG6M40K" target="_blank"><i>Beyond Watson</i></a>, a Sherlock Holmes story collection where each story had to be narrated by someone besides Dr. Watson.  You chose Violet Hunter as your narrator. What drew you to this Holmes character?</h4>
<b>LK: </b>Well, I feel next to Irene Adler she is the next best match for Holmes. Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson don't do very much to solve the case. Violet is left to do it herself with Holmes 'on call' should she need him! And Watson recognised this and felt the two would be a good pair...I agree. I didn't want to explore a 'love story' angle with them...no. But I felt she is one of the strongest female characters in his short stories.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Author Luke Kuhns</td></tr>
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<b>IHOSE:</b>  Last year your story collection, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Sherlock-Holmes-Scarlet-Thread-Murder-ebook/dp/B0167BICBY/" target="_blank"><i>The Scarlet Thread of Murder</i></a>, was released. The first tale in the collection is a bit of a mashup pastiche in that you had Holmes work with another Victorian detective character, Martin Hewitt. Why did you incorporate Hewitt into your Holmes tale?</h4>
<b>LK:</b> Widely speaking, no one knows about Hewitt. It's a sad truth. His stories are fun and he held the fort while Holmes took a dip in the Reichenbach Falls. These two (if we pretend they are real) would have been in business at the same time, and Sherlock Holmes, being who he is, would know and recognise talent. The two just work together, not because of their similarities, but because they are both very different but very brilliant! And I wanted to draw attention to other great characters in classic literature that aren't well known.<br />
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<b>IHOSE:</b>  You have now written Sherlock Holmes graphic novels, short stories, and a nonfiction book on his creator, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. What are some similarities you have found in writing these three different genres?</h4>
<b>LK:</b> Making interesting crimes is never easy. I take the same approach to writing the stories with regards to plotting. So that is the same too. But the real painstaking work is creating an interesting crime/puzzle that isn't too cliche or overdone and making it work in a quick and believable way.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 12.8px;">Stained glass at the main hall of Undershaw.</span></td></tr>
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<b>IHOSE:</b> If you were stranded on a desert island with just one Sherlock Holmes story, which would it be and why?</h4>
<b>LK:</b> <i>The Sign of Four</i>. It's my favourite novel...has a great mystery, a treasure hunt, and chase on the Thames. It's great!<br />
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<b>IHOSE:</b>  What are your current projects?</h4>
<b>LK:</b> I have a script for a new Sherlock Holmes comic book...I'm looking at making that into a reality. I'm currently working on my first non-Sherlock novel, but that's in very early stages with no release date in the near future. I've been changing the format of my website and how I conduct reviews, taking a more audio/video approach rather than text only. That's been fun and very time consuming too. I'm also knees deep in my Master program too...so there's a lot going on and changing of directions. Very exciting.<br />
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<b>IHOSE:</b>  Any last thoughts?</h4>
<b>LK: </b>Thanks for taking the time for this virtual chat! It's been great fun. I look forward to speaking again.<br />
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<b>Luke Kuhns</b> is an international crime writer and reviewer. His two best selling novellas <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Sherlock-Holmes-Studies-Legacy-Kuhns-ebook/dp/B00CMFP0X8" target="_blank"><i>Sherlock Holmes Studies in Legacy</i></a> and <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Sherlock-Holmes-Scarlet-Thread-Murder-ebook/dp/B0167BICBY" target="_blank"><i>The Scarlet Thread of Murder</i></a> have been praised by critics and fans of Sherlock Holmes. Luke has also authored two graphic novels including <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Sherlock-Holmes-Case-Crystal-Bottle-ebook/dp/B00FG2QF8I" target="_blank"><i>Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Crystal Blue Bottle</i> </a>and the critically acclaimed bone chilling horror <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Sherlock-Holmes-Horror-Frankenstein-Kuhns-ebook/dp/B00L9GLNM8" target="_blank"><i>Sherlock Holmes and The Horror of Frankenstein</i></a>, the world’s first Sherlock Holmes and Frankenstein graphic novel.<br />
He has contributed to several crime fiction and academic collections inducing <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Watson-Sherlock-Anthology-Stories-ebook/dp/B01GG6M40K" target="_blank"><i>Beyond Watson</i></a>, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Book-Sherlock-Holmes-Stories-Part-ebook/dp/B017J1CS1G" target="_blank"><i>The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories Vol 1</i></a>, and <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Fan-Phenomena-Sherlock-Tom-Ue-ebook/dp/B01A27TGLY" target="_blank"><i>Fan Phenomena Sherlock Holmes</i></a>.<br />
His latest title, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Welcome-Undershaw-History-Created-Sherlock/dp/1787050211" target="_blank"><i>Welcome to Undershaw: A Brief History of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle The Man Who Created Sherlock Holmes</i></a>, is a move into biographies. Luke has written a wonderful and unique history about Conan Doyle, his writings and his time living at his Surrey home, Undershaw.<br />
Luke has spoken at the University College London’s Past and Present Conference, debated in the Great Sherlock Holmes Debate 3 and 4, and has been featured on Japanese TV Network NHK. Luke’s official <a href="https://lukebenjamenkuhns.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">website</a> is a multimedia platform where he releases exclusive short stories and reviews popular tv series, films, books and more.<br />
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<i style="background-color: white; color: #0e0e0e; font-family: "times new roman";">Derrick Belanger is the author of the #1 bestselling book in its category <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="1519511957" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="1519511957" data-amzn-link-id="9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Peculiar Provenance" href="http://www.amazon.com/Sherlock-Holmes-Adventure-Peculiar-Provenance/dp/1519511957/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_3292728" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Peculiar Provenance</a><span style="border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-width: initial;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_3292728" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=9e2003200f68f2fe44eb4bcdd1a73f6d&_cb=1451973203084" style="border: none; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>, 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 <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="B017862MVS" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="B017862MVS" data-amzn-link-id="5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="Curse of the Deadly Dinosaur" href="http://www.amazon.com/Deadly-Dinosaur-MacDougall-Sherlock-Holmes-ebook/dp/B017862MVS/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_7842789" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Curse of the Deadly Dinosaur</a><span style="border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-width: initial;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_7842789" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=5293cce6e7483fecbc2d08a80a6fd7fa&_cb=1451973247482" style="border: none; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>, and he edited the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle horror anthology <a amzn-ps-bm-asin="B00P4E8AVI" class="amzn_ps_bm_tl" data-amzn-asin="B00P4E8AVI" data-amzn-link-id="a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a" data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword="A Study in Terror: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Revolutionary Stories of Fear and the Supernatural" href="http://www.amazon.com/Study-Terror-Revolutionary-Stories-Supernatural-ebook/dp/B00P4E8AVI/ref=as_li_bk_tl/?tag=thebakerstree-20&linkId=a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a&linkCode=ktl" id="amznPsBmLink_5010397" rel="nofollow" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">A Study in Terror: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Revolutionary Stories of Fear and the Supernatural</a><span style="border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-width: initial;"><img alt="" border="0" height="0" id="amznPsBmPixel_5010397" src="https://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?source=bk&t=thebakerstree-20&bm-id=default&l=ktl&linkId=a71c0c4edf6b4a9c56848bf35d8b468a&_cb=1451973259426" style="border: none; height: 0px; margin: 0px; max-width: 100%; padding: 0px; width: 0px;" width="0" /></span>. Mr. Belanger has recently started the publishing company <a href="http://www.belangerbooks.com/" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Belanger Books</a> which released the Sherlock Holmes anthology <a data-amzn-asin="1533202273" href="https://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Watson-Sherlock-Anthology-Stories/dp/1533202273/" style="color: #006f85; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Beyond Watson</a>. Derrick Belanger also is a frequent contributor to I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere. He resides in Colorado and continues compiling unpublished works by Dr. John H. Watson.</i><br />
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