Over on a Number of Things there is always a mystery going on. Recently it was Sherlock Holmes written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and it got me thinking – it’s been a long time since i have read any Sherlock Holmes, i wonder???

So off i trotted to the local library to see what was on offer, only to find they had lots of books on Sherlock Holmes but none of them were written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. How very bizarre i thought. I then trotted off to the local second hand book shop in great expectations (erm wrong book, wrong author) only to find they didn’t have any either. So, by this time i wanted a proper Sherlock Holmes book no other fakes would do.

Soooooooo i ended at the very posh and very beautiful book shop and there on the shelf was my heart’s desire. Now to me a book has to feel good when you pick it up. I wanted the first one ever written and alighted upon it in due course. Slipped it off the shelf and into my hands. It felt good. I wanted it but could i spare the money, but i wanted it, i desired it and in the end i quickly slipped it into my arms and it felt good and i trotted over to the cash desk, paid for it quickly and looking about me, making sure no one had seen me i slipped out of the book shop with the brand new copy of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s – A Study in Scarlet.

The first part of the book starts in true detective style with a dead body. Oh sorry! Need to back up a bit the book is narrated by Dr Watson, who is newly discharged from the army. He is looking for somewhere to live and a mutual friend introduces him to the one and only Sherlock Holmes. Back to the story the first part of the book starts with the usual murder and the usual suspects too. Only one of the suspects ends up has dead as the first victim. So two dead bodies???

Sherlock Holmes comes to the rescue of LeStrade and Gregson officers of the law and has the case all solved even before they have had change to look around. Eventually someone is arrested and thrown into jail for the murder of the first man but with the discovery of another body, now what?

It looks like the case is all sewn up, finished, over when the in part 2 of the book the story changes and goes in a completely different direction. It is titled ‘The Country of the Saints’ and surprising to me it is about President Brigham Young, the mormon pioneers and their trek to the Salt Lake Valley (being one myself, a Mormon that is not a pioneer, actually it’s a Latter-day Saint.)

I thought to myself ‘they can’t possibly be leaving the story unfinished??’ What’s happened to the story? it wasn’t finished. At first i wasn’t going to carry on reading but i am telling you i was very glad i did. There is a twist in the tale. In fact it’s the true tale, but i won’t spoil it for you. Then in the end we get usual Sherlock Holmes flourish and the story is over, the murderer is arrested and the story told.

I really enjoyed this book in the end, even if the middle was a bit odd but Sir Arthur Conan Doyle manages to twist the story around and around until it’s all laid out before us. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was born in 1859 in Edinburgh and died in 1930. He studied medicine in Edinburgh and later set up practice at Southsea. It was while he was waiting for his patient’s to arrive that he began to write and became a great success in the process.

I shall keep this one, but now i need the second one.