FriedEgg

Finally, I got around to reading some stories about the famous Sherlock Holmes. This book combines the first two collections of short stories the author wrote about the wily detective.

His amazing powers of observation and reasoning mean that little gets past Sherlock once he turns his attention to it. He constantly assimilates facts and particulars so that he might be able to make use of them at a later date. A knowledgeable amature chemist, no mean boxer and sublime violinist; he is a man of many talents. A fascinating character, it is probably more interesting observing him at work than it is becoming acquainted with the details of the cases he investigates.

I enjoyed reading most of these stories but I had to break them up so it took several months to complete this not insubstantial collection. A few really stand out, like "The Naval Treaty", "The Scandal in Bohemia" and "The Final Problem" but many others blur together in the memory due perhaps to their sameness. I get to the end feeling that I don't need to read any more of the short stories although I think I'd like to try a novel, probably The Hound of the Baskervilles.