The ace detective continues to enthrall us, as two new books, The Scientific Sherlock Holmes by James O’Brien and Mastermind by Maria Konnikova, show
THE death of Sherlock Holmes, as related in the December 1893 issue of The Strand Magazine, was met with sadness and fury. Fans wore black armbands to mourn their favourite detective, thrown from a cliff in mortal combat. They also sent scathing letters to Arthur Conan Doyle, who had written off Holmes to concentrate on more “serious” fiction.
A decade of literary failure persuaded the author to admit his error, averring that Holmes had actually survived.…
