London, 1889, and Dr James Mortimer is in need of the help of Sherlock Holmes. His friend, Sir Charles Baskerville, is dead, apparently scared to death outside Baskerville Hall, his home on Dartmoor. His family is haunted by the curse of a devil hound and Mortimer found giant canine paw prints near the body.

With Sir Charles’ heir, Sir Henry Baskerville, newly arrived from Canada, Mortimer fears that the curse – well, the dog – might well strike again. But even before they have left London, someone is stalking Sir Henry. With Holmes busy in London, it falls to Watson to head to Dartmoor. But with an escaped convict stalking the moor and a mysterious watcher lurking in the shadows, it seems that a giant glow-in-the-dark hound might be the least of his worries…

Fifteen years and I’ve finally got round to The Hound Of The Baskervilles. Why? Well, recently I lost a friend and colleague who was a big Sherlock Holmes fan and as he’s been on my mind, I thought it would be nice to take a look at Holmes’ best known adventure. Oddly it also got a few mentions at Stockport Noir at the weekend too – I’d already read it by then, but still seemed a bit of a coincidence.

This was written and published between The Final Problem and The Empty House – apparently its success led to the return of Holmes from his watery grave. And to be fair, it’s a cracking story. A rubbish mystery, but a cracking story.

The Holmes here is a nice chap. In other appearances, you sometimes question why exactly Watson is friends with him, but in this one, you can see their friendship clearly. The opening section has Holmes encouraging Watson to make deductions, praising him, even when he’s wrong. Later, when Holmes does something that really should properly p*ss Watson off, he charms Watson into forgiving him. Watson too gets a good showing, definitely one of his smarter appearances. There’s some good suspense, a couple of twisty plot developments…

… but let’s face it, once you know what’s going on in Baskerville Hall, which is quite early one, there is only one suspect, isn’t there? And all of Holmes’ deductions are based on information that we don’t have access to. So, as I say, as a mystery, this is poor.

But, to be absolutely clear, it’s still a superb read, a lot of fun for all the family, and would be a great place to start if you want to indoctrinate someone into the world of Mr Holmes – absolutely no long diatribe about murderous Mormons here.

But to finish with something else that got a few mentions at Stockport Noir – I should warn you that the dog doesn’t make it…