"It is so long a chain, and yet every link rings true..."

The Blue Carbuncle, the Engineer's Thumb, the Twisted Lip, the Yellow Face - the Red Headed League, the Reigate Squire, the Norwood Builder, the Speckled Band... these and all 51 more have all perplexed, intrigued and finally illuminated me, even as the smudge-covered, dusky-coloured hardback weighed down what should have been more dully-useful holiday luggage over the years...

... but for all my entrancement in my old-fashioned compilation of every short story, every charming pencil-black original illustration from The Strand magazine, every frustrated attempt to make progress in the impossibly-complex Spectrum 128k computer game, every visit to that famous address either in passing or in museum-exploring pilgrimage, every rippingly-antiquated shards of awkward dialogue and every seamily glamorous glimpse of London Victoriana...

... I'm ashamed to admit only just now getting around to reading my first Sherlock Holmes novel, The Hound Of The Baskervilles - and, well, enjoying the yarn - while being slightly disappointed by the actual absence of mystery. Yet even more disappointed upon reaching the end of the tale, the end of the reliable reading pleasure.

Onwards, then, to those other inexplicably-neglected long'uns: A Study In Scarlet and The Sign Of Four.
And then, to delve back again guiltlessly and gloriously, into those impeccable short forms, all 56 varieties.

Draw your chair up, and hand my me violin...