Sunday 11 June 2017

Warlock Holmes The Hell-Hound of the Baskervilles Book Review



BLURB

The game's afoot once more as Holmes and Watson face off against Moriarty's gang, the Pinkertons, flesh-eating horses, a parliament of imps, boredom, Surrey, a disappointing butler demon, a succubus, a wicked lord, an overly-Canadian lord, a tricycle-fight to the death and the dreaded Pumpcrow. Oh, and a hell-hound, one assumes.

MY THOUGHTS

I was intrigued by the premise of Warlock Holmes the Hell-hound of the Baskervilles, the second book in the series by G. S Denning, it isn’t the sort of book I would usually read but surprisingly I really enjoyed it. Some of the magic and fantasy realms did get a little bit confusing, especially towards the end but the plot and the story were gripping and I really engaged with the characters.

Warlock Holmes, the great fictional detective is rotting away and has become a diseased corpse. His faithful companion, Watson, has no idea what to do and contemplates the horrendous idea of chopping up his body and throwing the pieces into the Thames to be done with it. And Watson is also having to deal with their landlord, Mrs Hudson who is demanding their rent payment, how can he possibly explain Warlock’s situation to her? He can’t continue to make the excuse that he’s in France. Watson really is at his wits end.

I really liked how the author captured Watson and Warlock’s character. The Sherlock Holmes books are among my favourite, particularly The Hound of the Baskervilles, I thought that G.S. Denning did a great job with Watson and Warlock’s voice.

After a period of ill health, Warlock makes a miraculous recovery and soon finds himself entangled in mysteries that are waiting to be solved. There are several short mysteries for the pair to solve before Watson arrives at Baskerville Hall to protect Sir Henry Baskerville, the heir to the estate from an old family curse. There were a lot of humorous moments in the book which had me laughing out loud, particularly when Warlock infuriates Watson.


I did find some of the magic a little heavy at times and this may put some people off reading but the overall story telling was very good. This was an imaginative retelling of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s popular stores and I would definitely recommend it to fans of Sherlock Holmes, young and old. Thank you to Philippa Ward at Titan Books for sending me a copy to review. 

Publisher: Titan Books

Publication date: 16th May 2017

Print length: 352 pages


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