Dr. Watson Archives - Mostly Mysteries

The six stories in Orlando Pearson’s The Redacted Sherlock Holmes Volume III are a mixed bag. In some stories, such as and “The Book-Thief and the Blitz,” Holmes seems slow and withdrawn. In fact, Watson reports at one point,” Holmes spent the time we had in a daze.”

The stories range from good (“Some Parisian Hot-Desking”) to dull (“The Book-Thief and the Blitz”) to outright strange (“The Sussex Factotum”).

“Some Parisian Hot-Desking” has Watson and Holmes cornering and catching Sebastian Moran. Moran was second-in-command to Professor James Moriarty in the original Holmes canon. This story is well done.

In “A Christmas Carol” Homes makes good use of his propensity for disguises to woo a maid and thus get access to a house and solve his case.

“The Book-Thief and the Blitz” had Holmes and Watson away from London to help decode German messages during World War II. Holmes is not at his best in this story. As noted before, Watson even remarks that Holmes seems “in a daze.” A good portion of this story delves rather more deeply into breaking the German codes than necessary.

“The Sussex Factotum” deals with implications of the aberrant sexual proclivities of Eric Gill, a prosperous sculptor. This story is an instance where Holmes agrees with his brother, Mycroft, that doing nothing is probably the best option.

“The Doctor and the Demon” has the game of cricket at its center. Granted, we Americans may not be apprised of all the rules of this inimitable English sport. However, having Dr. Watson describe the game to Holmes slows the story down.

Enjoyable Read

All in all, I enjoyed the stories in The Redacted Sherlock Holmes Volume III well enough. But, in my opinion, Holmes could have been sharpened up a bit. He seemed sluggish in a few of the stories as mentioned above. Dr. Watson’s narration of the stories was well done.

With The Traitorous Templar, Richard T. Ryan does a good job of displaying his knowledge about the Knights Templar (a Christian/Catholic military order that provided soldiers during the Crusades). Holmes, and Watson get involved in a case dealing with nightly disturbances at an art collection. Some of the displays of armor purportedly belonged to the Templars and Jacques de Molay, the last Grand Master of the Templars.

A visit from a woman who turns out not to be whom she claims she is, and other events set the detecting duo of Holmes and Watson on a trip to a few of the last-known outposts of the Templars in England: a cave thought to be used by the Templars; a small, dilapidated church; and a small island off the coast of Cornwall. What begins as a desultory investigation as to who was leaving tallow droppings at the art gallery leads to a stealthy search for a treasure of gold and gems supposedly hidden by the Templars as their Order was being disbanded, and they were being denigrated and killed in the early 14th century. All this while being followed by persons unknown, but armed and dangerous, who were also after the treasure.

Mixed Bag

The Traitorous Templar is a mixed bag for me. The novel begins slowly with Holmes discussing the Templars’ history with Watson. There is also a large section directly in the middle of the Holmes/Watson story that deals directly with the Templars. This section envisions how they supposedly were victimized by one of their own turning on them, necessitating the hiding of the treasure. This digression would be very interesting as part of a novel dealing directly with the Templars. But it totally drops the reader out of the Holmes/Watson realm for several chapters.

Especially irksome is that, when the story returns to the Holmes/Watson milieu, Holmes goes over much of the same ground in his discourse to Watson on research he’d done while in London and Watson was in Cornwall. In my opinion, the digress to the time of the Templars could have been omitted entirely. Holmes’ discussion of his research could be broadened to include more of the Templar information.

The final third of the novel was the best part of this somewhat slow rendering of the Holmes/Watson world. Although still slow at points, it quickens slightly and includes a short appearance of Inspectors Gregson and Lestrade. The thieves who were shadowing Holmes and Watson, and who tried to abscond with the treasure, are dealt with.

Ryan effectively portrayed Holmes and Watson in The Traitorous Templar, but the pacing of the story left me wanting more. Holmes is off stage quite a bit and, thus, the banter between him and Watson is missing, for example. But overall, I enjoyed this book. I may seek out other Holmes and Watson tales penned by Richard T. Ryan.