My Horse Two Cents

"Silver Blaze," the first of "The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes" is the story of a missing prize horse, and the trainer whose murdered body was found out in a field near the horse's stable. Holmes and Watson travel by train to investigate the mystery, which may involve a rival horse stable, a band of gypsies, and a strange man snooping around the stable on the night of the murder.

As a pure mystery, "Silver Blaze" is one of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's most effective stories so far. Many of his mysteries lack for sufficient credible suspects. Often, there is one culprit favored by the police (who is of course the wrong one) and only one other possible character in the mix (who Holmes unsurprisingly reveals as the guilty party). This story has at least three possible suspects right away, and a police Inspector Gregory who does see holes in the theory framing the man already in custody. And hopefully without spoiling anything, I'll say that in the course of the story, a fourth suspect emerges.

There's also a nice break with tradition in how the background of the case is recounted. Ordinarily, Doyle brings in the client to converse with Holmes, and the first 1/3 to 1/2 of a story is a recitation of the facts by a heretofore unknown stranger. This time, Holmes provides the background details of the case himself as he and Watson are traveling to the site of their investigation.

There is a bit of a narrative slip near the end, in my opinion. It's always more powerful to actually show events happening where possible, rather than tell them. Holmes pulls someone aside at one point to have a private conversation out of Watson's earshot. They then return, and Holmes immediately recaps half of what was just said. Of course, the reason Doyle does this is so that he can preserve the other half of what was said as the reveal a few pages later. But weighing the drawing out of the mystery a short while longer against having the third recapping in the story of things that happened previously, I'd choose to expose the plot if it were me. Then again, I'm not a renowned writer whose work is still being read a century later.

I give "Silver Blaze" a B+. A good effort with enough compelling twists to set it apart from other Holmes tales.