So, I’ve never been much of a reader, but recently I’ve been dabbling a bit with the e-reader on my phone.
I decided to give the Sherlock Holmes books a shot and as one of those people that likes to do things more or less in order I started at the beginning with A Study In Scarlet. It proved to be the best place to start since I learned how the two of them met so even if this is a waste of time I’m still glad I got that background.
Anyways, the first part was good, I enjoyed reading it, but it seemed odd since Holmes caught the murderer and that was it, he never told us how. In the next part of the book we’re suddenly in the middle of Utah, surrounded by Mormans, talking about Brigham Young, building log cabins, adopted daughters running off with mountain men etc…
In fact, when I first started the chapter, I thought it might have been from another book and googled the title to make sure it was actually part of the same book. From what I read, this middle section is just filling us in on the backstory of the deceased and will eventually explain to us how they came to finding themselves dead…but Doyle really seems to be dragging it out. I’m hoping there’s a payoff for reading 60ish pages of backstory that seems like it could have been reduced to a few paragraphs. I have to admit there are parts that I’m just sort of skimming over.
Also, since I know about the Holmes/House connection as I read the book, I always see Sherlock as Gregory House, speaking with an American accent. Wilson isn’t playing Watson though. Probably because he doesn’t narrate the show.
Three of the four Sherlock Holmes novels, are really Sherlock Holmes short stories, with lengthy backstories for the villains shoehorned into the middle - and the remaining novel has Holmes off the stage for much of the story too, with Watson investigating instead. The basic problem is that Holmes is too smart to sustain a novel with him continuously at center stage… Sorry.
I suppose they do that with House as well. He tends to have his minions trying to figure out what’s wrong with the patient (or doing odd busywork) while he’s doing something unrelated to the POTW.
I usually recommend people start with Sherlock Holmes short stories rather than the novels, for more or less what’s mentioned: the novels can seem really padded and drawn out.
I downloaded A Study In Scarlet (the first book) and The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (The first of the short stories). I knew I wanted to read them in order and figuring it didn’t much matter where I started I just randomly picked one. Like I said, I really like the first part and I’m glad I started off with getting to see how they met, I’m just getting bored with this middle part. I think I have about 40 pages left or about 5 chapters. I usually read about a chapter or two a night so I should be done in a few days. Thing is, if it wasn’t part of this book, if it was something else, it wouldn’t be all that bad. The only reason it’s boring is because it’s the background on a couple of dead guys and even knowing nothing at all about this book or story, I know it’s going nowhere.
The second half of A study in Scarlet is all backstory; there is no more of Holmes’ investigation. I remember reading that book as kid and finding that a little bit strange as well.
It seems that Conan Doyle eventually figured this out too. The short stories don’t include long endings explaining the villain’s decisions, but instead focus on the cleverness Holmes displays in solving the crimes.
I agree that’s true of two of them – A Study in Scarlet and The Valley of Fear, but not [B[The Sign of Four** or Hound of the BAskervilles. The backstory sections are much smaler in those. The Sign of Four actually has Holmes almost all the way through, and is a pretty good read.
It’s odd that Doyle seemed to have such a hard time keeping Holmes in longer works. The pastchers since him have managed to do it. And before you say – ‘yeah, but look how awful they are’ – the shortcoming of those novels isn’t in their keeping Holmes in the story.
“The Sign of Four” is an entirely separate book from “A Study in Scarlet”. The latter was the first Sherlock Holmes story ever, published in Beeton’s Christmas Annual in 1887 in its entirety.
“The Sign of Four” was published in Lippincott’s three years later. They’ve since been published as individual volumes many times. Every omnibus edition I’ve seen clearly indicates that they’re separate books. Either you’ve misread the indications of your edition, or it’s an odd one that idiosyncratically depicts these two adventures as a combination.
? Mine had an ending. I read the same thing as you did, and skipped a lot of the Brigham Young part. I hate when authors derail their own stupid stories to tell another story. :rolleyes: I would have had Scheherezade killed the first night, I think.
Anyway he does eventually finish the story. It kind of turned me off, though.
I started reading Holmes last year and I was the same way. I read Study in Scarlet and then got to the Utah part and was wondering what the hell was going on.
I would say keep up with the other works though, they are usually pretty good.
It’s not out of place – this was the very first Sherlock Holmes story of any kind. There was not reason for anyone to expect anything. Doyle wrote a two-piece story, which is a quite legitimate thing to do. There really hadn’t been all that many before this and, except for Poe’s Auguste Dupin stories, no character quite like Holmes.
In a way, Doyle’s book is a quite remarkable thing – Holmes’ case had a number of unusual and outre elements in it, and the second half tells how the characters involved got into thagt situation – in a natural and believable way. Too many (especially beginning) writers of mysteries are content to come up with a bizarre situation for their detective to solve, with little or no backstory (and what they come up with is frequently outrageous and unbelievable). Doyle has turned his backstory into part of the novel, using the Holmes story as a setup for it.
So is the backstory the real mystery? As I’m reading it, am I supposed to be trying to figure out how these two Mormons found themselves in England and dead? And, it doesn’t help that even halfway (or so) through the backstory we haven’t spent much time with the the two victims from the first part. We briefly met them at the very beginning and they’ve been mentioned enough times to know that in the Mormon community they’re about is important as Brigham Young himself. But that’s about it (so far).
I would get that right out of your head if I were you. The similarities between House and Holmes are very superficial, and the differences much more profound and extensive. (And the same goes for Wilson and Watson.) For example, House treats everyone around him like shit, sometimes for a purpose, but more often just for fun. Homes, apart from some occasional mild teasing of Watson, is unfailingly polite and considerate of other people. House is a horn-dog. Holmes is almost entirely uninterested in sex. I could go on. House frequently loses control, Holmes never does. . . I could go on. You will not understand or enjoy Holmes if you are expecting him to be House.
Also, I think it is worth mentioning that when A Study in Scarlet first appeared, it made no great impact and was not particularly popular. The same goes for The Sign of The Four when it appeared a few years later (although some critics now think it is the best of Holmes). It was not until the short stories started to appear that Holmes really caught on, and most of the best stuff is in the short stories. Hound of the Baskervilles works pretty well as a novel (as does The Sign of The Four), but The Valley of Fear uses the same sort of structure, and thus has the same problem you are finding with A Study in Scarlet; if anything it is worse in this regard. Someone who loves the short stories (and there’s lots to love, although even they are uneven) will want to read A Study in Scarlet to find out about Holmes and Watson’s origins, but it is not the best place to start.
Yep, I think one can skip the entire backstory in A Study In Scarlet. I love the story simply because we get to see how Holmes and Watson meet, but the whole Mormon story thing is poop and I just skip it. It is however Doyle’s earliest Holmes work (isn’t it?), so he gets a pass for that.
Never fear, the next batch of short stories will rock.
The Mormon story isn’t a mystery – but Doyle arguably saw it as more of the story than the Holmes part. It’s at least of equal interest, considering the space it takes up. But Holmes already gave you the solution. You’re supposed to have Aha! moments as the parts click into place, I think.
When I said I see him as House, I meant I literally see Hugh Laurie (with an American accent) when I picture Sherlock. Not that I’m expecting him to be House.
I’ve always wondered if Sir Doyle wrote about some “unique American institutions” - The Morman Church in “Study in Scarlet”, the Molly Maguires (or knock-off there-of) in the “Valley of Fear”, the Ku Klux Klan in “Five Orange Pips” - just because his largely Victorian England audience of the era may have heard or read a bit about them, but didn’t really know much them, and so he could get away with some broad caricatures of those groups in his stories (sort of like those 1980s action movie villains of the month)