The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories, Part IX

The 18 stories in Marcum’s ninth anthology featuring traditional Sherlock Holmes pastiches (after Part VIII) will satisfy fans of Conan Doyle’s originals. All the (largely unknown) contributors plausibly round out the characters of Holmes and Watson, including Marcum himself, who in “The Helverton Inheritance” presents the doctor as less than enthralled about filling in for a colleague whose practice is dominated by unfriendly patients. Marcum couples his convincing portrait of Watson with an unsettling adventure in which the recipient of an unexpected valuable legacy is required by its terms to spend a night in an isolated home. Other highlights include Stephen Gasper’s riveting “The Lambeth Poisoner Case,” about a search for a serial killer, and Geri Schear’s “The Fairy Hills Horror,” a take on an untold tale of Watson’s, the Addleton tragedy, that more than lives up to its name. Sherlockians will rejoice that more volumes are on the way. (July)