Sherlock Holmes: The Complete Novels and Stories, Vol. 1

I am excited to reread Sherlock Holmes! 5 star for the novel. And 1 star for the book binding. I wanted a copy so I can hold the book and read it. This copy of the book is breaking apart. It came nice and looks good as new but the binding is bad. I just started reading it and already a few pages came loose. Upon inspection if I bend the book binding to hold while reading I think all of the pages will fall out.

I really can't find anything to complain about with this edition. You get twenty-three classic Sherlock Holmes mystery stories, The Hound of The Baskervilles, A Study in Scarlett, and The Sign of Four for less than $8. This is a great value - you might expect to pay $8 or more for a copy of The Hound of the Baskervilles alone. Granted, this collection doesn't contain much analysis and the Introduction is brief, as are the additional comments and whatnot at the end of the book. But I didn't purchase this book for the literary analysis - I wanted the stories! And the stories are wonderful. It's easy to see why so many people were upset when Arthur Conan Doyle killed off Sherlock Holmes. He is one of the most popular and enduring literary figures of all time and has been the inspiration for countless imitators and devotees. If these stories were being published today, they would be a bestseller, right up there with the Kinsey mysteries of Sue Grafton and the Harry Potter books (okay - maybe not THAT big). This is also an interesting time for historical literature because Conan Doyle is one of the first (to my mind, anyhow) pioneers of genre fiction. Though he didn't "invent" the detective story, he certainly mastered it. And aspiring mystery writers would be well-advised to read these stories for clues on how good stories should be told. The book itself is light and easy to carry - perfect for bringing along in your suitcase or backpack while travelling. The binding is solid and the type is readable, if not particularly large. All in all, this is a great collection of stories that no mystery fan should be without. And at this price, there's no reason not to own them.

If you're only going to buy one of the volumes of the Complete Sherlock Holmes, then this is the one I would recommend. The later stories are very good, too, but the ones in this one are better.

If you are a mystery fan, this is a can't-miss collection of the early Sherlock Holmes stories. While most of the stories are not as clever as the ones in the original Sherlock collection ("The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes"), this book introduces two pivotal figures in the series - Sherlock's eccentric brother Mycroft and the evil mastermind Professor Moriarity. Most fans agree that the stories in ADVENTURES and MEMOIRS set the standard to which all other Sherlock stories are compared.