Tuesday, March 26, 2013

The Valley of Fear (Arthur Conan Doyle)


Another Sherlock Holmes tale; another gem.  In The Valley of Fear, John Douglas is murdered in his ancient, moat-surrounded manor home in England.  This American has a storied past, and the story is unusual in that the first half is the present-day accounting of the murder and Holmes' genius in solving it, and the second half is a flashback set in mid-west America, explaining how John Douglas came to be such a wanted man.  It's unusual that so much of the story would be devoted to the backstory, but not unheard of- in fact, Conan Doyle does the same thing in A Study in Scarlet.  Any Holmes story is a good one, so read with delight if you're a fan of the famous sleuth.

Rating: A

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