Philip Purser-Hallard The Vanishing Man (2019)
I loved the films with Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce when I was a teenager, and so much so that I have a vague memory of checking one of the Conan Doyle novels out from my local library, but otherwise I couldn't really care less about Sherlock Holmes. This is one of an ongoing contemporary series relating further adventures of the great detective which is distinguished through having been written by Philip Purser-Hallard, who is great, so here I am with what may be the first book I've bought new rather than second hand this year.
The last Conan Doyle I read was The Lost World which I actively hated, so I'm not sure whether Purser-Hallard gets Holmes right to the standard a Holmes purist would expect, but it feels right to me. My only raised eyebrow was hoisted during a few of the more dialogue heavy chapters, page after page of exposition which is something I've never liked because it always feels as though the author would rather be working on a television series; but on the other hand, I suspect this may simply be part of the Holmesian territory, so it's not a problem.
Most appealing of all from my point of view is that this is definitively a Purser-Hallard novel, as such returning to themes which run through his previous works, notably those of transcendence and spiritual evolution, even to the point of bringing Gideon Beech, the playwright modelled on George Bernard Shaw, back from Peculiar Lives of 2003.
It's not difficult to see why this one held such appeal for Purser-Hallard given the setting of an era during which a number of his thematic preoccupations were in the ascendant - the birth of science-fiction from nineteenth century spiritualism, new ideas about God and humanity and our place in the universe, and a chance to play around with all of this in The Vanishing Man; so we additionally get a stand-in for Madame Blavatsky, proposals hinting at the cosmology of C.S. Lewis' cosmic trilogy, passing references to Hy-Brasil, and an occult detective named Constantine - although patently not the one famed for hanging out with Swamp Thing. Purser-Hallard accordingly stretches the limit of Holmes' universe as far as it will go in the general direction of the fantastic without quite jumping the shark, then bursts the bubble, returning us all to Earth in elegant fashion and no pandering either to expectations of steampunk cliché or any other attempt to jazz things up by turning it into something else entirely.
I'm still not convinced we need new Sherlock Homes in 2019 - although I'll concede there's no harm in it - but if we really must, then I'm very happy to have Philip Purser-Hallard writing it.
I loved the films with Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce when I was a teenager, and so much so that I have a vague memory of checking one of the Conan Doyle novels out from my local library, but otherwise I couldn't really care less about Sherlock Holmes. This is one of an ongoing contemporary series relating further adventures of the great detective which is distinguished through having been written by Philip Purser-Hallard, who is great, so here I am with what may be the first book I've bought new rather than second hand this year.
The last Conan Doyle I read was The Lost World which I actively hated, so I'm not sure whether Purser-Hallard gets Holmes right to the standard a Holmes purist would expect, but it feels right to me. My only raised eyebrow was hoisted during a few of the more dialogue heavy chapters, page after page of exposition which is something I've never liked because it always feels as though the author would rather be working on a television series; but on the other hand, I suspect this may simply be part of the Holmesian territory, so it's not a problem.
Most appealing of all from my point of view is that this is definitively a Purser-Hallard novel, as such returning to themes which run through his previous works, notably those of transcendence and spiritual evolution, even to the point of bringing Gideon Beech, the playwright modelled on George Bernard Shaw, back from Peculiar Lives of 2003.
It's not difficult to see why this one held such appeal for Purser-Hallard given the setting of an era during which a number of his thematic preoccupations were in the ascendant - the birth of science-fiction from nineteenth century spiritualism, new ideas about God and humanity and our place in the universe, and a chance to play around with all of this in The Vanishing Man; so we additionally get a stand-in for Madame Blavatsky, proposals hinting at the cosmology of C.S. Lewis' cosmic trilogy, passing references to Hy-Brasil, and an occult detective named Constantine - although patently not the one famed for hanging out with Swamp Thing. Purser-Hallard accordingly stretches the limit of Holmes' universe as far as it will go in the general direction of the fantastic without quite jumping the shark, then bursts the bubble, returning us all to Earth in elegant fashion and no pandering either to expectations of steampunk cliché or any other attempt to jazz things up by turning it into something else entirely.
I'm still not convinced we need new Sherlock Homes in 2019 - although I'll concede there's no harm in it - but if we really must, then I'm very happy to have Philip Purser-Hallard writing it.
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