‘Does anyone really believe what happened at the Reichenbach Falls?’
All resurrections are fascinating; those that bring back to life characters who capture the imagination even more so. In the first authorised Holmes pastiche by Anthony Horowitz, The House of Silk, Sherlock Homes came back from the dead with all the charm of a lost diary found at the back of a dusty antique desk. It was only a matter of time before his nemesis made a dramatic reappearance. For is there a Sherlock Holmes nerd out there who has ever believed that Moriarty was truly gone, when bartitsu could bring back their hero from the dead? The world seeks balance in all things. Ergo Moriarty, the second book.
Any reader of light mystery stories will tell you that sustaining the reader’s interest is difficult beyond 50,000 words. Horowitz’ challenge was formidable – in a book double the length of the usual Holmes novels, he would have to achieve the delicate balance of sustaining interest through plot, atmosphere and characterisation, Holmes purists snapping at his ankles at every step, expectations sky high post the global success of The House of Silk.
Preserving the canon
Horowitz achieves this, because his work aims to satisfy the purist. This is no fan fiction; the attention to detail extends not just to plot, but seeps down to mannerisms, figures of speech, even thought processes. This is the work of a writer who has lived and breathed Conan Doyle, has shared empathy with what Doyle would and would not condone in his characters and then has found the grey areas where he could colour in to add dimension to the canvas, not vandalise it.
It has worked marvellously. Unlike other adaptations that I shall not name, there is not a single moment in either book where one feels that Holmes or Watson would never have behaved in such a way or said this or written that. The sleight of hand comes in the development of the peripheral characters about whom the purist knows little and in giving them a greater significance in his books to tell his story.
So it is with the plump 14-year-old boy who appears fleetingly in The Final Problem, but has a more significant and sinister role in Moriarty. Reginald Clay from The Red-Headed League appears in an enjoyable cameo. In a starring role, Athelney Jones from The Sign of The Four reappears here as a Holmes acolyte, obsessed with the methods of his hero. It is a neat little trick to have a completely new witness to the story as told by Doctor Watson, where incidents that seemed insignificant to the reader are given a completely different tone by virtue of a second point of view.
What really happened?
The all-important question is asked by our narrator, Frederick Chase, a Pinkerton Detective Agency investigator, who is introduced to Inspector Athelney Jones at the falls the day after the incident. From a coded message hidden on the professor’s person, Athelney Jones and Frederick Chase must search the grimiest edges of Victorian London to uncover the agoraphobic criminal mastermind who has unleashed a reign of terror and stem the tide of brutal violence.
The story rushes in an action filled breakneck pace from here, building up the suspense until the breathless finales. Horowitz pulls off the challenge of holding the reader’s interest for 90,000-odd words in Moriarty by setting the story partly in Europe, partly in the East Coast and partly in London and by weaving two plots that unfold independently, so that he has your attention till the very last page. But only just.
The challenge of the length is beginning to tell on the book. The Sherlock Holmes novels are made for a shorter format – doubling the length arbitrarily robs them of their pace. A sleight of hand can never be a long drawn out affair and hope to succeed in the long run. I hope the estate realises that second guessing a master storyteller like Conan Doyle on such structural issues is a dangerous and unnecessary risk. If I had to quibble a bit more, I would say that I missed the magic lantern feel of Conan Doyle’s gas lit Victorian London; Horowitz’ London is darker and sinister, by far.
Moriarty appeared in only two Holmes stories, yet his shadow looms large over the imagination; initially just over Holmes and Watson’s, then like his extensive crime network, over our collective imagination across a century. The time for a return was nigh. Without adding any spoilers, I would like to say that the book deals with the rare challenge of an absent protagonist, yet the shadow lingers and solidifies into reality, thanks to the writer’s mastery.
Jash Sen is the author of The Wordkeepers and its sequel, Skyserpents.
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All resurrections are fascinating; those that bring back to life characters who capture the imagination even more so. In the first authorised Holmes pastiche by Anthony Horowitz, The House of Silk, Sherlock Homes came back from the dead with all the charm of a lost diary found at the back of a dusty antique desk. It was only a matter of time before his nemesis made a dramatic reappearance. For is there a Sherlock Holmes nerd out there who has ever believed that Moriarty was truly gone, when bartitsu could bring back their hero from the dead? The world seeks balance in all things. Ergo Moriarty, the second book.
Any reader of light mystery stories will tell you that sustaining the reader’s interest is difficult beyond 50,000 words. Horowitz’ challenge was formidable – in a book double the length of the usual Holmes novels, he would have to achieve the delicate balance of sustaining interest through plot, atmosphere and characterisation, Holmes purists snapping at his ankles at every step, expectations sky high post the global success of The House of Silk.
Preserving the canon
Horowitz achieves this, because his work aims to satisfy the purist. This is no fan fiction; the attention to detail extends not just to plot, but seeps down to mannerisms, figures of speech, even thought processes. This is the work of a writer who has lived and breathed Conan Doyle, has shared empathy with what Doyle would and would not condone in his characters and then has found the grey areas where he could colour in to add dimension to the canvas, not vandalise it.
It has worked marvellously. Unlike other adaptations that I shall not name, there is not a single moment in either book where one feels that Holmes or Watson would never have behaved in such a way or said this or written that. The sleight of hand comes in the development of the peripheral characters about whom the purist knows little and in giving them a greater significance in his books to tell his story.
So it is with the plump 14-year-old boy who appears fleetingly in The Final Problem, but has a more significant and sinister role in Moriarty. Reginald Clay from The Red-Headed League appears in an enjoyable cameo. In a starring role, Athelney Jones from The Sign of The Four reappears here as a Holmes acolyte, obsessed with the methods of his hero. It is a neat little trick to have a completely new witness to the story as told by Doctor Watson, where incidents that seemed insignificant to the reader are given a completely different tone by virtue of a second point of view.
What really happened?
The all-important question is asked by our narrator, Frederick Chase, a Pinkerton Detective Agency investigator, who is introduced to Inspector Athelney Jones at the falls the day after the incident. From a coded message hidden on the professor’s person, Athelney Jones and Frederick Chase must search the grimiest edges of Victorian London to uncover the agoraphobic criminal mastermind who has unleashed a reign of terror and stem the tide of brutal violence.
The story rushes in an action filled breakneck pace from here, building up the suspense until the breathless finales. Horowitz pulls off the challenge of holding the reader’s interest for 90,000-odd words in Moriarty by setting the story partly in Europe, partly in the East Coast and partly in London and by weaving two plots that unfold independently, so that he has your attention till the very last page. But only just.
The challenge of the length is beginning to tell on the book. The Sherlock Holmes novels are made for a shorter format – doubling the length arbitrarily robs them of their pace. A sleight of hand can never be a long drawn out affair and hope to succeed in the long run. I hope the estate realises that second guessing a master storyteller like Conan Doyle on such structural issues is a dangerous and unnecessary risk. If I had to quibble a bit more, I would say that I missed the magic lantern feel of Conan Doyle’s gas lit Victorian London; Horowitz’ London is darker and sinister, by far.
Moriarty appeared in only two Holmes stories, yet his shadow looms large over the imagination; initially just over Holmes and Watson’s, then like his extensive crime network, over our collective imagination across a century. The time for a return was nigh. Without adding any spoilers, I would like to say that the book deals with the rare challenge of an absent protagonist, yet the shadow lingers and solidifies into reality, thanks to the writer’s mastery.
Jash Sen is the author of The Wordkeepers and its sequel, Skyserpents.
