The Nature of Things

Morocco, 1924. Control of the country is divided between two European nations - Spain and France. But that control is slipping as a native revolt gains momentum. It is not only Spain and France that maintain an interest in Morocco. Germany has mining interests there and seeks to promote and protect those interests, and England, (or, at the time, the British Empire) by nefarious means, tries to guide events into pathways that will benefit its own foreign interests. At the center of the British efforts, in Laurie R. King's fictionalized telling of the events, is Mycroft Holmes and, of course, where Mycroft spins and weaves, his younger brother Sherlock lurks in the shadows. Sherlock Holmes and his young wife Mary Russell were already in the area in a continuation of the action which we saw in the last novel in this series, The Pirate King . They are participating in the filming of a motion picture about - yes - pirates. Sherlock breaks away from the company to pursue his own adventur...

Laurie R. King's Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes series has been a favorite of mine since I first discovered it a few years ago. The thing that I have enjoyed most about it is the relationship between young Mary and the great Holmes. I found the growth of the relationship from beekeeper's apprentice to partner and wife to be thoroughly believable and thoroughly entertaining. The problem that I have with the latest installment in the series,  Pirate King , is that there simply isn't much of that relationship here. Early on, Mary is sent away from Sussex and Sherlock on a supposed mission for Inspector Lestrade. She is to be an undercover agent embedded in a company of silent motion picture actors. Lestrade allegedly suspects that something nefarious is going on with the band of thespians. Illegal drugs? Gun running? It's never made quite clear and apparently Lestrade doesn't really know. Nevertheless, Mary is supposed to sort the whole thing out. Mary very soon suspects...

My first literary love affair was with Sherlock Holmes. I met him at the highly impressionable age of twelve and fell instantly in love. I read every Conan Doyle story that featured him - read them more than once. Since then, I have had many loves in my life. Indeed, I have been a very loose woman, literarily speaking, but one never forgets one's first love. He is always special. A few years ago when I read a review of a book called The Beekeeper's Apprentice , I was both fascinated and a bit outraged. How dare anyone tamper with Conan Doyle's perfect creation! But in the end fascination won out over outrage and I picked up the book and read it, and thus a long ago love affair was rekindled, but this time with the added fillip that it became a three-way affair - Sherlock, Mary Russell, and me. Mary is Laurie King's unique creation who was introduced in The Beekeeper's Apprentice as a young orphan girl in Sussex who came under the sway of her neighbor, the be...