Holmes
A few months ago I mentioned on this website/blog about the book I had won in a drawing at our local library – the Butte Valley Library. That book, for those who don’t recall, or who missed that post, was The Complete Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. This edition is a collected volume of every Sherlock Holmes story written by the man who created the character.
I’ve finally gotten around to starting the book. I’m only 375 pages, roughly, into at this point – not even halfway through. A few of the stories I’ve read before. Many of them are new to me. I first began reading Sherlock Holmes stories when I was a child in elementary school – no pun intended! I think I read my first Holmes case in 3rd or 4th grade. I always was an advanced reader.
Now, as an adult, reading these stories, I find that I’m not as overcome with awe at the fictional detective’s remarkable deductive skills as I had been as a child. But, still, I’m very much enjoying the book. And I had completely forgotten how humorous parts of the Holmes stories are, too! Both Sherlock Holmes, and Dr. John Watson – from whose point of view we are told these stories – both had senses of dry humor that I quite appreciate. And, I’m also not ashamed to say that short story titled The Adventure of the Speckled Band creeps me out just as much as an adult as it did when I read it as a child! Even remembering it, and how Holmes solved that mystery, knowing what was coming, I was still unnerved by it. I have no idea as to why; I’m not afraid of snakes. Yet something about that story gives me chills each time I read it!
Who else out there is a Sherlock Holmes fan?
Scott Harper
Novelist/screenwriter Scott Harper’s official blog 