elentarri 's review for:

Sherlock Holmes: The Definitive Collection by Arthur Conan Doyle

4.0

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These Sherlock Holmes stories are far more entertaining than I expected.  I love Doyle's 'The Lost World' and his Professor Challenger character, but  consulting detective Sherlock Holmes and his friend Dr. Watson are completely different.  The mysteries may be more or less unmemorable, but the characters is what makes these stories for me.  I like the role Watson plays as Holmes' unofficial biographer, and occasional side-kick.  I also found Mrs Watson amusing in her encouragement of getting Dr. Watson out the house to help Sherlock - obviously she wants some alone time.  Too bad she didn't last long.   Sherlock's' foibles are also fairly amusing, not to mention the reaction of his clients and onlookers when he explains his reasoning and solves the mystery.  It's too bad that there also isn't more of Mycroft Holmes (and his Diogenes Club), who is just too lazy to be bothered to do anything physically strenuous, but is still around to help his brother out occasionally.  I'm also surprised at how limited Professor Moriarty's page time is given his reputation as Holmes' equal in intelligence, and the subsequent fuss made out of him in modern adaptation.  On coming to the end of the Sherlock Holmes collection, I find that I enjoyed the short stories more than the novels, which tend to digress too much.  The stories provide an atmospheric snap-shot of Victorian London and provide entertaining moments in the company of an interesting character and his long suffering friend.