by Graham Moore
First published 2010
Harold White joins the Baker Street Irregulars, the premier Sherlock Holmes society, expecting scholarly discussions about Victorian detective fiction. Instead, he finds himself pursuing the most coveted artifact in Holmes scholarship: Arthur Conan Doyle's lost diary from 1893 to 1901. This journal might explain why Doyle killed Holmes in "The Final Problem," then brought him back eight years later. When London mourned the detective's death in 1893, readers wore black armbands and called Doyle a murderer. The author kept meticulous records but never revealed his reasons for the resurrection. After Doyle's death, one diary vanished. Now the world's top Doyle expert lies dead in his hotel room, and Harold must channel everything he learned from detective stories to solve both the murder and the mystery of the missing diary.
Genres: historical-fiction, adventure, academic, amateur-sleuth
Vibes: suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: amateur-sleuth, historical-mystery
Setting: London, Baker Street
Period: 1893-1901, 20th-century
350 pages · Hardcover · Twelve