The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

Poor Richard Lancelyn Green! I knew his name through the scandal headlines that surrounded his death two years back, a suicide which he tried to stage as a murder, hoping or so it seems to cast a sinister light on the family of Conan Doyle and their auction of period Holmes memorabilia at Christie's which he, RLG, thought should have been disposed of elsewhere. And laboring in the shadow of his far better known father Roger Lancelyn Green, it can't have been easy. In any case it's great that at least one of his anthologies, THE FURTHER ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES, will keep his name alive in a positive way. I don't understand why he changed the names of stories while presenting them here. Why bother retitling Adrian Conan Doyle's story "The Red Widow"? Is his own title, "The Adventure of Ainsworth Castle," any more thrilling? Surely it's misleading to present the famous story by Arthur Whittaker, "The Case Of The Man Who Was Wanted" under a title like "The Adventure of the Sheffield Banker." Please! Whittaker's tale isn't very good, but it has the historic distinction of having been mistaken for an actual Sherlock Holmes story (for it was found among Conan Doyle's papers) and published under the Master's name by misguided scholars in 1948. SC Roberts also has his title changed. I guess Lancelyn Green wanted them all to be called "The Adventure of . . ." and felt no compunction about renaming these old chestnuts where they didn't fit the bill. A small point, but one perhaps illustrative of the sometimes magisterial nature of the man's character. Otherwise you couldn't ask for a more interesting smapling of Holmes pastiche. The Stuart Palmer story is good, and an unexpected choice considering that its companion, "The Remarkable Worm" is far better known. "The Adventure of the Trained Cormorant," formerly known as plain "Holmes in Scotland," is a splendid reconstruction of one of the cases mysteriously alluded to by Watson in one of the canonical tales. Maybe I'm the only fan in the world who's not blown away by D O Smith, and I'll try reading more of Smith's work to catch the vibe, but I was less than overwhelmed by reading the tedious "Adventure of the Purple Hand," which seems padded out to twice its optimum length. However, many fans whose opinions I respect swear by Smith and I'll read some more before I put that baby to bed. Take it all and all, a fine anthology and a nice way to remember poor old Richard Lancelyn Green.

Richard Lancelyn Green has examined nearly a century's worth of Holmesian pastiches and collected some of the very best in this book. Stories date from 1920 through the 1980's. Many pastiches try to parody or reinvent the originals, but theses stories affectionately recapture the flavor and tone of the canon.

I've just finished this and am amazed by how much I enjoyed it - I'd bought it expecting to hate it but not so. It's very patchy but no more so than Conan Doyle's original stories, and the only really terrible bit is one effort by his son Adrian which is a complete failure, although a very involved thing about Scotland (which left me wondering, why couldn't he have just put the brooch in his pocket? - you'll know what I mean when you've read it) tries the patience rather. Best are the 'Purple Hand' and 'Second Stain' stories, both of which the man himself would have been very proud of, but all are honourable additions to the mythos, hugely enjoyable and very sensitive to the much-loved originals.