The Quallsford Inheritance: A Memoir of Sherlock Holmes from the Papers of Edward Porter Jones, His Late Assistant

Biggle is among the many authors who have recently borrowed Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's legendary sleuth to solve mysteries again. This is a good one, full of the ambience of England in 1900. The narrator is Edward Jones, 16, assistant to Holmes after Dr. Watson retires. Known by his middle name, Porter, the lad reports on an odd request for ""pitapayas'' in the London market, an invented word that alerts the detective to a possible crime. Emmeline Quallsford mentions ``pitapayas'' when she asks Holmes to investigate her brother Edmund's death at their seaside estate. Porter and the detective find no motive for the man's supposed suicide, nor for murder. Townspeople had liked Edmund and depended on his small import business for their livelihood. It doesn't take long, however, for Holmes to turn up evidence of smuggling and other chicanery. If the chief evil-doer's identity is no surprise to the great sleuth, it will be to readers. ( June 30)