By Laurie R King
The "beekeeper" is a retired Sherlock Holmes and his apprentice an orphaned, very intelligent teen, Mary Russell. Impressed by Mary's astuteness when he meets her on Sussex Downs, he invites her to tea. Each fills a need in the other's life and together they work successfully on a number of increasingly more complex cases, and develop a close relationship. Mrs Hudson, Dr Watson and Mycroft Holmes are among the familiar names in this story.
I loved this book uniting an aging Sherlock Holmes with a young American woman. When Laurie R King started writing sequels, I read quite a few. While they did not quite measure up to the first book (how can you top finding Sherlock Holmes among the beehives?) they were fun, and here are a few more mini reviews:
A Monstrous Regiment of Women
Here Mary is portrayed almost as a superwoman: all-knowing (in the areas of theology, human nature and crime detection) and physically invulnerable (sustains knife attacks, poisonings, and even a series of forced heroin injections with little ill effects). The book deals with only one case which surrounds a religious sect involved with biblical theology, feminism, and women's suffrage and just wasn't as exciting as some of the cases in the first book. The brilliant Holmes is only a background character, but even his skills are a bit too far fetched.
A Letter of Mary
Holmes and Russell, now wed, work at solving a mystery involving the murder of Mary's friend Dorothy, an archaeologist who has just given Mary an ancient letter, apparently from Mary Magdalene to her sister Judith. Not quite as implausible as book 2, but not as well developed or restrained as book 1.
The "beekeeper" is a retired Sherlock Holmes and his apprentice an orphaned, very intelligent teen, Mary Russell. Impressed by Mary's astuteness when he meets her on Sussex Downs, he invites her to tea. Each fills a need in the other's life and together they work successfully on a number of increasingly more complex cases, and develop a close relationship. Mrs Hudson, Dr Watson and Mycroft Holmes are among the familiar names in this story.
I loved this book uniting an aging Sherlock Holmes with a young American woman. When Laurie R King started writing sequels, I read quite a few. While they did not quite measure up to the first book (how can you top finding Sherlock Holmes among the beehives?) they were fun, and here are a few more mini reviews:
A Monstrous Regiment of Women
Here Mary is portrayed almost as a superwoman: all-knowing (in the areas of theology, human nature and crime detection) and physically invulnerable (sustains knife attacks, poisonings, and even a series of forced heroin injections with little ill effects). The book deals with only one case which surrounds a religious sect involved with biblical theology, feminism, and women's suffrage and just wasn't as exciting as some of the cases in the first book. The brilliant Holmes is only a background character, but even his skills are a bit too far fetched.
A Letter of Mary
Holmes and Russell, now wed, work at solving a mystery involving the murder of Mary's friend Dorothy, an archaeologist who has just given Mary an ancient letter, apparently from Mary Magdalene to her sister Judith. Not quite as implausible as book 2, but not as well developed or restrained as book 1.
No comments:
Post a Comment