Since his first appearance in Beeton’s Christmas
Annual in 1887, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes has been one
of the most beloved fictional characters ever created. Now, in two paperback
volumes, Bantam presents all fifty-six short stories and four novels featuring
Conan Doyle’s classic hero--a truly complete collection of Sherlock Holmes’s
adventures in crime!
Volume II begins with The Hound of the Baskervilles, a haunting
novel of murder on eerie Grimpen Moor, which has rightly earned its reputation
as the finest murder mystery ever written. The Valley of Fear matches
Holmes against his archenemy, the master of imaginative crime, Professor
Moriarty. In addition, the loyal Dr. Watson has faithfully recorded Holmes’s
feats of extraordinary detection in such famous cases as the thrilling The
Adventure of the Red Circle and the twelve baffling adventures
from The Case Book of Sherlock Holmes.
Conan Doyle’s incomparable tales bring to life a Victorian England of
horse-drawn cabs, fogs, and the famous lodgings at 221B Baker Street, where for
more than forty years Sherlock Holmes earned his undisputed reputation as the
greatest fictional detective of all time.
About the Author
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was born on May 22, 1859
in Edinburgh. He studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh and began to
write stories while he was a student. Over his life he produced more than
thirty books, 150 short stories, poems, plays and essays across a wide range of
genres. His most famous creation is the detective Sherlock Holmes, who he
introduced in his first novel A Study in Scarlet (1887). This
was followed in 1889 by an historical novel, Micah Clarke. In 1893
Conan Doyle published 'The Final Problem' in which he killed off his famous
detective so that he could turn his attention more towards historical fiction.
However Holmes was so popular that Conan Doyle eventually relented and
published The Hound of the Baskervilles in 1901. The events of
the The Hound of the Baskervilles are set before those of 'The
Final Problem' but in 1903 new Sherlock Holmes stories began to appear that
revealed that the detective had not died after all. He was finally retired in
1927. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle died on July 7, 1930.