Description
Roger Riccard, respected and prolific author of Sherlock Holmes stories with over fifty to his credit since his first novel in 2012, has already taken readers through the Twelve Days of Christmas and An Alphabet of Cases. He now he turns his attention to The Seven Deadly Sins.
Envy – A Perpetrator in a Pear Tree. A retired judge has been murdered in a locked tower room with its only window too narrow for anyone to enter. Can Holmes solve how was it done?
Pride – The Etherege Escapade. Holmes investigates a kidnapping case, but finds the official evidence suspect. When pieces of the victim’s clothing are found on the banks of the Thames the affair takes on a more sinister aspect.
Wrath – The Game at Chequers. Mycroft Holmes requests that his brother comes out of retirement and conducts an appraisal of security measures at the Prime Minister’s residence at Chequers. What he finds is deadly.
Greed – The Case of the Merchant Mogul. Abraham Loew is kidnapped and subsequently found dead after the ransom is paid. Was this a kidnapping gone wrong or premeditated murder?
Lust – The Backstage Pirates. A former client calls upon Holmes to stop the harassment of actresses at a theatre where there have also been kidnap attempts.
Gluttony – The Case of the Final Morsel. A food critic has been threatened due to his bad reviews. Will he heed Holmes’s warning or succumb to his last meal?
Sloth – The Writer’s Block. A novice playwright is missing and his latest work stolen. His fiancée fears the worst, but is she being over-dramatic?
Review by Roger Johnson, editor of the Sherlock Holmes Journal
The author, or as he regards himself, ‘the editor of John H Watson’s Notes’, is a prolific writer of Holmesian pastiches. The seven stories that comprise this work, each one of which is in short chapters in the modern style, are based on the seven deadly sins, as were codified in the 13th century by St. Thomas Aquinas. For the edification of readers, these are, in no particular order, pride, lust, sloth, gluttony, envy, greed and wrath. All seven stories are well told, with neatly constructed plots. One has a historically based storyline related to Irish affairs in 1916, and another has a particularly ingenious murder weapon. Two incarnations of Lestrade make their appearance, but I will say no more on that. Overall, the book is eminently readable and enjoyable, and is amply suffused with Canonical references. I thoroughly recommend it.
