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Checkout FunnyFact.com | SuperHeroBooks - The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes: The Complete Short Stories (2 Vol. Set)
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List Price: $95.00
Our Price: $51.45
Your Save: $ 43.55 ( 46% )
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton & Company
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.8
EAN: 9780393059168
ISBN: 0393059162
Label: W. W. Norton & Company
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton & Company
Number Of Items: 2
Number Of Pages: 1878
Publication Date: 2004-11-30
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Studio: W. W. Norton & Company
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating: 
Summary: Work of love, but very bad for a first time reader
Comment: If you've already read all the stories, this is a great set of books, and perhaps you might learn something new. If you're a new reader who is actually trying to read the stories as stories, this is a soul-crushing dissection that will suck all the joy out.
First the good - you can feel the love in these books. Large format, heavy, decent enough paper, the definitive Sidney Paget illustrations, extensive annotations, timelines, 'biographies' of Watson and Holmes, a clear obsession with the subject.
The downside is that same obsession. Each page is divided in half, with the inner half being the actual story, the outer half being the annotations. HALF. There is nearly as much annotation as story. Now imagine you're reading along and you see a little superscript '10' next to a word. My natural inclination is to glance at the annotation - the problem is you don't know whether it's crucial or worse than useless. It could tell you useful information such as every mention of the game of whist in the official Holmes Canon or the definition of a word that might not be in much use today, like 'whist'. It could be idle fan speculation such as 'Mister Blah speculates in his Holmesian analysis 'Maids in Deerskin Peril' that this maid was actually the long lost fifth cousin of Prof. Moriarity because she shares the same last name as his fourth cousin!' It could be bafflement that there was apparently no hotel in the town of Foochester where Holmes said there was in the story 'The Bunnies of the Foovilles'. Worst of all it could be pointing out actual factual errors by Holmes, like a barometer reading that Holmes seems to think would indicate fair weather but a meteorologist says means it should be raining already (and of course these are all written off as Watson's errors, which gets very tedious after a while). Or noting that 'Watson refers here to a story that by the chronology could not have taken place already because of x, y, and z'.
The reality is perhaps too easy: Arthur Conan Doyle cared only slightly for Holmesian consistency and didn't spend much time worrying about it. When you get obsessed fans trying to explain or retcon some inconsistency it's bound to be a horrible sight, and these are brought out equally with the genuinely useful annotations. When you glance over you have no way of telling which it will be in advance.
I read the stories as a child and loved them, and am trying to re-read them again, but this obsessive, nitpicking nerdgassing is destroying all my love. Imagine you're reading Wizard of Oz while little text bubbles are popping up describing everything wrong with the story.
Against all my training, I am teaching myself to completely ignore all the annotations (and thus half the page) and perhaps will go back later and re-read the comments.
So again, if you've already read all the books, these are excellent. If not, read a collection that consists of only the stories themselves first.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Fantastic Collection
Comment: This collection has it all. Well presented with a plethoa of extra information, this is a great addition to any Sherlockian's library!
Customer Rating:
Summary: What obsessions are for!
Comment: What a product! When you read something like this you begin to realize the real depths of obsessive thinking. There's so much to learn here -- exact details relating to late 19th century Britian; considered essays on where exactly Watson was shot (there is some consensus he must have been shot while stooping over, to take into account various Doyle references); and more than that, watching fans do their best to bring it alive.
Kind of reminds me of Potter.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Great for first timers and seasoned fans
Comment: This was the first time I read any Sherlock Holmes and I was not disappointed. But what really made the experience such a fun time was the vast number of info accompanying the novels. The notes are right next to the text so you don't have to keep flipping pages, plus various pictures abound throughout the volume capturing the times of Holmes and Watson.
After reading it myself, I lent this volume to my good friend who can pretty much recite any line from the novels and he absolutely loved it.
So if you are a fan or just curious about all the hype, this is a must!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Calling all Baker Street Irregulars
Comment: While most people have read at least one Sherlock Holmes stories others have not only read them all but have studied every detail of them. The author, Leslie Klinger, is one of the latter group. He is one of the foremost experts on the 'Canon' as devotees call the Holmes stories, and a member of The Baker Street Irregulars, the oldest and most exclusive club of Holmes scholars.
Klinger follows the accepted practice of the Irregulars in that he treats the stories as factual, rather than fictional accounts. This volume covers the four full length novels: "A Study in Scarlet"; "The Sign of Four"; "The Hound of the Baskervilles" and "The Valley of Fear" completing his study of the Canon that had begun with his two volume treatment of all the shorter works. As with the earlier works the book is printed in two columns, one containing the text of the story and the other containing the notes from that section. The book is illustrated with engravings that accompanied the stories in the magazines that first published them. The notes that Klinger has included with the text cover a wide range of subjects from explanation of outdated slang expressions to speculations by the author and other experts on people and locations the stories were actually based upon to in depth explanations of details. In addition both in the notes and in appendices Klinger offers his own and others theories as to the dating of the events in the stories.
This is a beautiful book, one that any fan of Holmes and Watson will surely enjoy. Someone who is reading the stories for the first time might find themselves suffering from information overload but anyone familiar with at least some of the stories will delight in finally discovering what some of those odd references meant. Also it is interesting to see that at times Watson or perhaps his 'agent' Arthur Conan Doyle, made some errors in their accouts leaving the impression that the 'Master' (Holmes) made some errors.
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Editorial Reviews:
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A cause for international celebration—the most important Sherlock Holmes publication in four decades. This monumental edition promises to be the most important new contribution to Sherlock Holmes literature since William Baring-Gould's 1967 classic work. In this boxed set, Leslie Klinger, a leading world authority, reassembles Arthur Conan Doyle's 56 classic short stories in the order in which they appeared in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century book editions. Inside, readers will find a cornucopia of insights: beginners will benefit from Klinger's insightful biographies of Holmes, Watson, and Conan Doyle; history lovers will revel in the wealth of Victorian literary and cultural details; Sherlockian fanatics will puzzle over tantalizing new theories; art lovers will thrill to the 700-plus illustrations, which make this the most lavishly illustrated edition of the Holmes tales ever produced. The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes illuminates the timeless genius of Arthur Conan Doyle for an entirely new generation of readers. 700+ illustrations.
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