I’ve been a fan of Laurie R. King’s series about Mary Russell and her older husband, the legendary Sherlock Holmes, since the first book hit the stores, so of course, I had to have the latest adventure the very second it came out. When The God of the Hive arrived, however, I put it aside, planning to savor it while on vacation. Instead, I read all the paperbacks I’d brought with me, so that I could leave them for my mother, and didn’t read this novel until I got home.

One of the things I love about this series is the level of detail King includes. While she doesn’t have to know what passed for the best acne treatment in Holmesian London, she does have to know where one can find certain kinds of stationery, or where a bolthole might be located.

In this book, which is a direct sequel to the previous installment, The Language of Bees, Russell and Holmes are still separated by the requirements of their current case – Holmes fleeing with his injured long-lost son, and meets up with a Scottish doctor, who ends up being a fabulous addition to the existing cast of characters. Mary, on the other hand, has the aeroplane pilot, and Holmes’ half-Chinese granddaughter to contend with, though she, too, hooks up with a helper who turns out to be quite beneficial to all concerned.

There isn’t much detection in this novel – there is character and there’s plot, but it’s basically a chase scene interrupted by action.

The good news, however, is that it’s still, undeniably King’s work, which is always incredibly compelling reading.

• Grab your current read.
• Let the book fall open to a random page.
• Share with us two (2) “teaser” sentences from that page, somewhere between 7 and 12 lines.
• You also need to share the title of the book that you’re getting your “teaser” from … that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you’ve given.

Laurie R. King’s Sherlock Holmes/Mary Russell novels are some of my favorite mysteries ever, and not just because I like taking a break from a world where we discuss hair growth shampoo and spending time in a world where high tea is a normal event. I’ve been a Holmes fan since as long as I can remember, but I love the relationship that King has created with his protege’ cum wife Mary. It just works.

Like many of her readers, the “to be continued” ending of the last novel really disappointed me, which is why I’ve been counting the days until The God of the Hive was ready. My copy arrived today. I can’t wait to read it!

Evening, and I might have curled up to sleep fully clothed except it had occurred to me that children required putting to bed. Estelle and Goodman were in front of the fire, he on the floor with Damian’s sketch-book on his knee, she stretched with her belly across the tree-round he used as a foot-stool, narrating the drawings for him. I had found the book in my rucksack, astonished that it had survived this far, and leafed through its pages before I gave it to her, making sure it contained none of his detailed nudes or violent battle scenes. Some of the drawings I had found mildly troubling, but doubted a small child would notice.

– from The God of the Hive, by Laurie R. King (page 80)

Lately, I’ve been in a mystery mood – everything from the kinds of novels where dead bodies are wrapped up in rugs, to the kinds of novels that are more about puzzles. I’m reading the Aurora Teagarden series, by Southern Vampire Mysteries author Charlaine Harris, but I’m re-reading Laurie R. King’s latest Holmes/Russell novel The Language of Bees as well.

The Teagarden novels actually predate the Sookie Stackhouse series, and while they share the same southern flair, they’re also a bit cozier, and a bit gentler. These are modern mysteries for those of us who still hold Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot fondly in our hearts.

As to Laurie R. King – I reviewed a number of her Holmes/Russell novels this spring, as I was re-reading them all (and filling out my collection) in preparation for the most recent book. She writes amazingly plausible Holmes situations, adding a sidekick/wife/colleague who blends perfectly into the world.

Don’t believe me? Check out this trailer for the most recent book:

In the latest installment of the Holmes and Russell series, The Language of Bees the bees Holmes is raising in Sussex serve as both metaphor and counterpoint to the action-packed mystery. One of his hives is swarming, something bees apparently do when they suspect their keeper is not returning, and Mary is left alone with that problem, as Holmes as followed their latest client into London.

The nature of this story makes it impossible to review without minor spoilers. The client is question Holmes’ son, we are told, from an affair he had with Irene Adler during the years in which he was supposed to be dead. The mystery: the location of this grown son’s wife and small daughter.

Obviously there are tramps across wet moors, nights spent in boltholes with amenities (or a lack thereof) that are a far cry from the scale of a Riviera hotel – in fact, over the entire series both Holmes and Mary Russell have spent an inordinate amount of time being wet, dirty, cold, or hungry – conditions I normally object to reading about, but don’t mind in these stories in the slightest.

There is also familial angst (what if Holmes’ son murdered is family, what if Holmes’ loyalty is to the son he barely knows rather than Mary?) and a wild aeroplane flight to enhance the mystery.

Sadly, while the mystery is solved, at the end of the novel we are confronted with three words that the author says were meant to offer hope of another story, but which I always find frustrating: To be continued.

Goes well with hot tea and scones or crumpets followed by a hot bubble bath.

Just when you thought it was safe to revisit this blog, I’ve got yet another Holmes/Russell novel to review. Of the nine books in the series, so far, I have to confess that this one is my favorite because it delves into Mary’s past in San Francisco.

Locked Rooms picks up exactly where The Game left off, with Holmes and Russell on a ship en route to California, with a sojourn in Japan we don’t hear much about. This time there are no shipboard masquerades where we see Mary donning the 1920′s-equivalent of a hot school girl costume, because Mary is having nightmares. Nightmares about her childhood in San Francisco, circa the 1906 earthquake. The problem, of course, is that Mary doesn’t think she lived in SFO at that time.

It was surreal reading about Sherlock Holmes walking the streets with which I’m so familiar, and the murder mystery part of the novel was intriguing, as always. What I found so much more compelling, however, was the internal struggle Mary Russell had, between what she thinks she remembers, and the cold hard facts.

A word of caution: While many of the Holmes/Russell novels can be read out of sequence, this one really requires a working familiarity with the previous books in the series.

When I first realized that The Game was the name of the seventh Holmes and Russell mystery, I thought it referred to a literal game. I knew it didn’t mean XBox, of course, since these novels take place in the twenties. Chess, I thought, might be the game that was…afoot.

I was wrong, and pleasantly so. The game in the title is a double entendre, referring both to the game of observation and spying, and on literal game (wild boar), or, make that a triple entendre, because it also refers to the roles people play when shifting among different social circles.

This novel sees Sherlock Holmes and wife/partner Mary Russell heading to India, where they are to locate one Kimball O’Hara, aka Rudyard Kipling’s Kim. I confess, I never read that Kipling story – though I’ve read others – and I wonder if I’d have appreciated this novel more if I had, but even without that background information, I quite enjoyed this adventure which had Holmes and Russell on a ship, a donkey cart and even, at the end an aeroplane.

As always, King has given us a rollicking good time, and Holmes’ voice rings true.

My Holmes/Russell reading fest draws to a temporary close with Justice Hall, which, while much later than O Jerusalem in terms of internal chronology, is nonetheless a direct sequel.

In this novel, Holmes and Russell are called to the aid of friends originally met in Palestine, Mahmoud and Ali, who are now back home in the English personalities, and dealing with all the angst and politics that large, wealthy families seem to corner the market on. There aren’t any mentions of modern diseases like mesothelioma, but there are hunting parties, hidden relatives, and even a severe case of sepsis.

It includes many of the favorite elements of all these novels – snarky comments from Mary, wry observation from Holmes, a near-perfect period setting, and great disguises. And, like all of King’s work in this series, leaves the reader wanting more.

I’ve noticed that when I read King’s work the Holmes I hear in my head speaks in Jeremy Brett’s voice, and I think that proves the excellence of her work.

• Grab your current read.
• Let the book fall open to a random page.
• Share with us two (2) “teaser” sentences from that page, somewhere between 7 and 12 lines.
• You also need to share the title of the book that you’re getting your “teaser” from … that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you’ve given.

As I’m still on my Holmes/Russell kick, it should come as no surprise that this week’s teaser comes from Justice Hall. Speaking of “kicks” – I’m kicking myself for not picking up the Sherlock Holmes box set of DVDs when it was on sale at Circuit City before they went out of business.

In any case, here are my teasers:

“And over the week-end, particularly when the house guests arrive, listen and watch closely. Map out currents, as it were. And before you protest that you do not know what we are looking for, I am aware of that minor problem, and can only trust that you have sufficient mental flexibility to work a case that is not yet a case.” He swung the rucksack over his shoulder, and then, with his hand on the door-knob, paused. “But, Russell? Watch yourself. I believe that as the investigation develops, we will find that these placid waters have been concealing any number of powerful tides.”
– from Justice Hall, p. 74, by Laurie R. King

My marathon of Laurie R. King’s Holmes and Russell series reached The Moor last night, and left it this morning. When I’m not sleeping, I’ve been reading, though mainly in fits and starts.

In any case, this book is sort of a loose sequel to The Hound of the Baskervilles, which is, of course canon Holmes, in that it takes place in and near Dartmoor, and involves Baskerville Hall, but it it’s not JUST about that.

Instead, this novel sees Holmes bringing Mary to see his old friend the Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould, who lives at Lew House, and is near death (of old age), and wants Holmes to track down the strange appearances of a ghostly carriage and a ghostly dog. Of course this dog and the Baskerville Hound become intertwined, and the investigation involves both Holmes and Mary Russell (who are married by now) getting wet, dirty, and injured.

Need a refresher course on the original story? Since you’re presumably already at your desktop or laptop computer in order to read this, you can click over to YouTube where someone has put up the Granada television series version of The Hound of the Baskervilles in several parts.

Here’s part one to get you started:

I’ve reviewed work by Laurie R. King in this blog before, but finding a couple of her Holmes & Russell novels at Half-Price Books last weekend, and then finding out that she had a new book in the series out this year has spurred me to re-read the entire series.

I’d forgotten how refreshing it could be to immerse myself in a novel where no one had cell phones, or worried about upgrading their computer memory, or complained about having 500 channels and nothing to watch. As well, re-reading these novels with a slightly more mature eye gives me the ability to really pay attention to some of the nuances I’d missed the first time around.

If you’re not familiar with the series, the first novel, The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, introduces us to a character who would be a Mary Sue under hands any less deft than Ms. King’s. This Mary – one Mary Russell – is a teenage girl sent from America to live under the “care” of an aunt, who holds her fortune in trust. One of her neighbors in their remote corner of Sussex just happens to be Sherlock Holmes.

The two form a somewhat unlikely friendship, especially considering Holmes’ oft-noted misogyny, that eventually blooms into a partnership of crime-solving equals. Imagine the tag line: He’s a famous detective who retired and took up beekeeping. She’s a young Oxford student studying Theology and Chemisty. They fight crime!

But the thing is, they do.

Of course, they also bicker, banter, and bargain their way through many adventures, and leave the reader – or at least this reader feeling only that the book has ended too soon.