Medium – Book
About the Book – Mrs Hudson, the redoubtable housekeeper of Sherlock Holmes, and Flotsam, the maid and her investigative assistant, return in the third of these ‘Holmes and Hudson Mysteries’. The book follows Flottie as she works as a maid at 221B Baker Street in the 1880/1890s (we assume!) One day, as Flottie arrives home from some errands, she is witness to a terrible carriage accident and hears a man’s dying words – a message to Sherlock Holmes. The tragedy puts into motion a series of events involving a missing Viscount, an ancient manuscript and a deserted town where the dead may be coming back to life. Holmes and Watson set out to solve the case, accompanied by Mrs Hudson and Flottie, and soon they are catapulted into the usual intrigue and mystery.
My Rating – 3/5
My Thoughts – Last year, when I was doing the Popsugar reading challenge, I read the first in the series of Mrs Hudson books and really enjoyed it. This one, quite frankly, was a bit ‘meh’. Mrs Hudson was a cleverly written and drawn character, as is Flottie, who is just fantastic and who I would very much like to adopt. Holmes and Watson are close enough to the canon characters to be believable to someone who is a bit of a Holmesian and unlike the previous book, there wasn’t the large number of inaccuracies with the timelines etc. The characters were generally well drawn and had their own distinct voices.
The plot though, was what let this book down, and I just found that it dragged a bit. The villains were a bit obvious, as was the twist at the end of the story. There were a couple of characters who just seemed a bit superfluous, including one who seemed only to appear a couple of times to add drama and save Flottie, give a clue, and then disappear into the ether. The book did feel as if it could have ended 50 pages earlier, and I kind of wish that it had, to be honest. I’m curious to see what number 2 and number 4 books are like in this series, but can’t say that I will be beating the door down of the library to get them!
Jen's Book Blog 