The latest installment in Hugh Ashton’s contains three more classic-style Sherlock Holmes short stories.
I must say, I am seriously starting to believe that Ashton is the incarnation Sir Arthur Doyle! Every single book, he surprises the reader with brilliant stories, sleuthing at its best and the much desired character development that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle himself never got around to.
We learn more about the detective’s personality and his methods in an affair that could threaten the stability of the British Empire in “The Affair of the Vatican Cameos”.
In “The Reigate Poisoning”, our favorite sleuth tries to figure out if there is indeed a case of evil stephmother at hand.
And in the third and final story our narrator is John Clay, one of the henchmen of that evil genius himself: Moriarty.
I especially loved all the references to other Sherlockian tales, illuminating here and there and tying stories together to a new total. And letting Clay do the talking brings a refreshing perspective into the organization of Professor Moriarty, who has been eluding Holmes for so long. It all makes for a coherent total of stories throughout all of Mr Ashton’s publications about Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson as well as added enjoyment for the reader of his tales.
In short, I keep looking forward to new stories by Hugh Ashton as they never disappoint, are always engaging and well-written, do justice to the original creations of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and are simply some of the best out there in the detective genre.
