The Return of Moriarty

Suppose Sherlock Holmes' version of the final, fateful moments above Richenbach Falls were a fabrication established to save his own life and enact a truce between him and his intellectual equal, that Napoleon of the London underworld, Professor Moriarty? In this suspenseful drama set three years after the "deaths" of Holmes and his rival above the Swiss falls, this novel brings Moriarty back and sets him down in the midst of a city-wide turf war between his factions and those who have sprung up in his absence. Holmes is a minor character here, never seen but referred to numerous times, especially in the matter of the eventual fate of his would-be assassin, Colonel Moran. Instead of this being a tale of the greatest of Victorian detectives, this is presented as the story of his darkest foe, the ingenious crime lord Moriarty. Here one will find violence and cunning in the impoverished, crime-infested London of the 1890's. Within these pages a reader will discover why Holmes frequently stated that Moriarty was his equal in intellect. Author Gardner did an admirable quantity of research into the lifestyles and language of those who lived in the setting featured in this novel. These details contribute to a level of realism often reached for but rarely achieved in stories set in this period. This is a crime novel that has strong characters and a fast-moving plot, and anyone who has ever loved the Conan-Doyle Sherlock Holmes mysteries, or who has an interest in Victorian London--especially its criminal side--should love this book.