wytchcroft

i've been working out a list of my favourite Sherlock Holmes tales (not as easy as it sounds!) - not necessarily the best dozen but those which i can read and re-read with undiminished pleasure despite the passage of time.

the illustrious client - casebook
the devil's foot - last bow
the red headed league - adventures
the dancing men - return
charles augustus milverton - return
the greek interpreter - memoirs
the bruce partington plans - last bow
the man with the twisted lip - adventures
the final problem - memoirs
the lion's mane - casebook
the cardboard box - memoirs
a scandal in bohemia - adventures

As for which stories i dislike... well there are a few of course, considering the number of stories, the time span in writing (30 odd years) and the circumstances of their composition it would be impossible for there NOT to be a few duds.

However, there is a story that i dislike strongly but which is often touted as one of the very best in the canon: The Speckled Band, that melodramatic blot on the Holmesian copybook.

Here's why:

// Holmes parted the steeple of his fingers and leaned forward with barely suppressed excitement. "So your sister was yet living when you found her?!"

"Indeed Mr Holmes, though it had taken her every last ounce of strength to crawl down the hall and into my arms - and so it was I that heard clearly the last words my sister spoke. She named her murderer Mr Holmes, with her dying breath!"

"Great Heavens!" I exclaimed.

Holmes expression had become fixed. "And the words - what were they? Pray be exact."

"Exact?" The young woman was bitter. "They are words I shall never forget. Shuddering, her lips pale and pinched she whispered 'Oh sister - the Professor it was she -'

'She?'

'No, a rat!'

'A rat?!?!?'

'Yes, no - it was a s-'

'Snake?'

'The Speckled Band!'

And with that my darling sister closed her eyes and her spirit departed with a groan."

"Well Watson," said Holmes at last, "what do you make of it?"

"The Speckled Band? Perchance a group of miscreant gypsies."

"Quite so - I admit that I had considered the idea of a snake - but clearly a pained and dying woman would not have been so vague, she would have spoken with deadly clarity."

"True enough Holmes, don't you agree Miss Stoner?"

"No, it was a snake."

Holmes leant back with a sigh. "Oh," he said with finality and reached for his beloved cherry-wood pipe. "Right you are."

..................

Holmes bends the willow... "It's for your own good Sir Arthur!"

And for the record - here's the list of stories i avoid:
the speckled band, the boscombe valley mystery, the golden pince-nez, the missing student, the missing three quarter, the three gables, the mazarin stone, the blanched soldier, the noble bachelor, the beryl coronet.