A Fatal Mistake & The Rising Ransom

Review: This publication contains two new stories. The longer and more complex is Hugh S. Scullion's A Fatal Mistake, an adventure of Wiggins, formerly leader of Holmes's Baker Street irregulars and now a professional investigator himself. The setting is mostly Dulwich, Norwood and Sydenham - parts of south London that Mr Scullion knows well, as did Arthur Conan Doyle. The style is earthy and often humorous, though the punctuation is highly erratic, and the story is well illustrated with photographs of the area.

So too is the second, slighter, story, The Rising Ransom by the late Douglas Moreton. This is the last of his Sherlock Holmes stories, and not a bad one to end on, being a clever (and cleverly titled) tale set in the author's native Lancashire, well-buttressed by historical research.

Reviewed by: Roger Johnson, [District Messenger 193, 1999]