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Sherlock Holmes and the Long Acre Vampire by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Features
Paperback
(Large Print)
Reader Reviews
Brisk and affectionate Holmes pastiche, October 22, 2003
Reviewer:
Fred Harvey
from Birmingham England
Author Val Andrews is -in addition to being a prolific author of short pastiche Holmes novels -an actor and an accomplished magician .It is doubtless why the books which feature theatrical backgrounds and characters are the liveliest entries in a middling series and this book is a good example of the type of book I mean. Its setting is late Victorian London ,a city in thrall to Bram Stoker's novel Dracula ;the book has caused a sensation and none other than noted actor-manager Sir Henry Irving is staging a play based on the book and is starring as the sanguinary Count. Unfortunately a series of murders takes place in Long Acre ,near the Lyceum Theatre where Irving is plying his trade and the murders are set up to look like vampire attacks -puncture marks on the neck ,pasty faced victims etc .Holmes is engaged by Irving to look into the matter as he fears he may be blamed.Holmes quickly establishes that human agency is behind the deaths and that someone is setting the great actor up. Before we find out who we are treated to a brisk if implausible plot which sees Holmes impersonating Irving impersonating Dracula and a variation on the unmasking of the culprit which takes place on the stage of the Theatre Royal in Brighton . Its flambouyant and as befits the subject theatrical in style and entertaining if you dont think too closely about the credibility of it all. It seems to be ending on a valedictory note with the great detective preparing for retirement and Lestrade actually retiring .As in the earlier book on the Society of Seven we see Watson voicing doubts as to the efficaciousness of the death penalty ,a note which seems at odds with both the character and the Holmes canon. I do not consider the intrusion of modern authorial sensibility to be acceptable in an authentic pastiche and this tub thumping is annoying . Okay book and series devotees will enjoy
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