Rating: 
Summary: The Hound Of The Baskervilles
Review: Having read many other Sherlock Holmes short stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, I decided to read this book to see what the Sherlock Holmes novels were like. All in all I thought this book was excellent. The plot was smoothly paced, never slowing down too much and there were various climaxes that are typical to Doyle's stories. Told from Watson's point of view (as all the Sherlock Holmes stories are) the books story takes place in "real time" chapters as well as chapters that are letters which Watson has sent to Holmes. This is where the only real disappointment of the book lies, Sherlock Holmes is absent in most of the story. Overlooking this, however, all the other characters in the story are marvelously created and entirely believable. And as always, people are not always as they first appear. As usual, the story leaves you in suspense the whole time and finally reveals the solution to you until right at the end when you are on the edge of your seat. All in all, I found this book to be a fine example of Sherlock Holmes literature. It is a fine mystery novel that is very eloquently written. It is for this reason that I give this book a 4.8/5 or on amazon's rating scale, a 5.
Rating: 
Summary: Hounded by the Family Curse?
Review: Sherlock Holmes is approached by a concerned doctor from Devonshire, in this longest and most famous of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's mysteries. A novel in its own right, this tale of the macabre murder on the moor (which houses a desolate prison) takes Holmes from London to the dreaded Grimpen Mire-treacherous with pockets of quicksand. But nothing will deter the famous Victorian sleuth from helping an innocent man discover the truth about the family legend. Is it really a hound from Hell or something more worldly which threatens to wipe out the Baskerville family?
Even Holmes expresses reserve about taking on the devil himself, for he admits that this foe is as vicious and clever as any he has encountered. Forced to go undercover, Holmes delegates faithful Dr. Watson to guard the new baronet at Baskerville Hall, with serious instructions to send regular reports of all he uncovers to him in London. Doyle's style includes lenghty dialogue, unrealistically long and detailed letters, with alternating slow and fast pacing; the interesting denouement, where all lose ends are explained, occurs curiously two months later.
THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES proves vintage Victoriana, where Holmes' mind proves as fertile and agile as the master criminal's elaborate schemes to defraud the true heir. Holmes uses both his "irregulars" and Scotland Yard to help him achieve justice on the moor. If this is your introduction to the sleuth who resides at 221-B Baker Street, be sure to enjoy an anthology of his fascinating and deadly short stories.
Rating: 
Summary: Nothing superb about Holmes.
Review: "The Hound of the Baskervilles" is the first (and now only) Sherlock Holmes book I have read (only because my book club chose it) and I was beyond bored with it. Nothing was mysterious or suspenseful about it. It was full of babble and slow adventures. Sherlock Holmes was hardly even in it, since Dr. Watson was the narrator and main experiencer of events. Very overrated in my book. I do not recommend.
Rating:
Summary: Nothing superb about Holmes.
Review: "The Hound of the Baskervilles" is the first (and now only) Sherlock Holmes book I have read (only because my book club chose it) and I was beyond bored with it. Nothing was mysterious or suspenseful about it. It was full of babble and slow adventures. Sherlock Holmes was hardly even in it, since Dr. Watson was the narrator and main experiencer of events. Very overrated in my book. I do not recommend.
Rating: 
Summary: Not as good as Holmes' short stories.
Review: A mysterious hound is haunting a family estate, and the new heir has employed Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson to investigate the hound, find out the death of his relative, and save the heir's life. Throughout the book, the neighbors, the townspeople, an escaped convict and are all suspects. While not a large book, the Hound of the Baskervilles does trudge along at some points. The someone antiquated language aside, it does delve into more detail and much more build up than a typical Holmes' short story does. So while in a short story, the mystery would be solved in minutes, in this book, the mystery takes a while to come forth. For example, in the beginning there is a mysterious person in a stagecoach following the heir. The mystery is only solved at the end, but with all the other events that took place, the reader has already lost interest in that particular person. I personally forgot about it, thus it did not intrigue me at all. Also, in much of this book, Holmes is not even present. The wit and mystery are substituted with settings and descriptions instead, not Doyle's strongest points. While a classic mystery which is still good, it can come out as somewhat unsatisfying.
Rating:
Summary: Not as good as Holmes' short stories.
Review: A mysterious hound is haunting a family estate, and the new heir has employed Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson to investigate the hound, find out the death of his relative, and save the heir's life. Throughout the book, the neighbors, the townspeople, an escaped convict and are all suspects. While not a large book, the Hound of the Baskervilles does trudge along at some points. The someone antiquated language aside, it does delve into more detail and much more build up than a typical Holmes' short story does. So while in a short story, the mystery would be solved in minutes, in this book, the mystery takes a while to come forth. For example, in the beginning there is a mysterious person in a stagecoach following the heir. The mystery is only solved at the end, but with all the other events that took place, the reader has already lost interest in that particular person. I personally forgot about it, thus it did not intrigue me at all. Also, in much of this book, Holmes is not even present. The wit and mystery are substituted with settings and descriptions instead, not Doyle's strongest points. While a classic mystery which is still good, it can come out as somewhat unsatisfying.
Rating:
Summary: The Hound of The Baskervilles
Review: Having never read any Sherlock Holmes before, or any mystery novels besides Nancy Drew, I picked this up one day for a quick read. I was pleasantly surprised, I ended up finishing it in one sitting because it was so exciting. The story centers around a curse haunting an ancient family on the moor, which involves a spooky black hound and plenty of strange people.
While others might complain about the time Doyle spends on the setting, I thought it added greatly to the spookiness. It takes place on the moor, which is a dreary enough place already, but Doyle adds in other details that give the moor as sinister quality. Now that I have read other Sherlock stories I can see that none of them devote as much time to the setting, but the setting here is also an important part of the story.
The thing that many readers will find strange is the actual absence of Sherlock Holmes himself from much of the story, with Watson narrating and doing much of the investigating. However, I thought this added even more mysteriousness to the story, as there is an entire piece missing until you catch up with Sherlock. There are plenty of other good characters in this story as well, something missing from short stories that tend to focus solely on Holmes and Watson.
This is a great introduction to Sherlock Holmes, as well as an exciting story. Of course the language can be archaic and the story is complex, but it's not anything anyone older than 12 can't handle. If you like Hound of the Baskervilles, you'll also enjoy any of the Holmes short stories too
Rating:
Summary: review
Review: One of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's best works in my opinion, a carefully and cleverly crafted thriller, it'll keep the reader on the edge of his/her seat. A storyline so unpredictable, that one would never trust their instincts. It is so well written, that no matter how many times one reads it, it never seems to age.
Rating:
Summary: Dogs man worst friend
Review: The Hound of the Baskervilles is an intriguing book, filled with mystery and adventure around every turn. The author uses more descriptive words rather than cheap thrills to scar the reader. When reading the book, I saw that it was rather interesting, I thought that I had the mystery figured out, but I was far from discovering the truth. Read the book......if you want to be scared and learn a thing or two about mystery solving you have picked the right book to read.
Rating:
Summary: The quintessential Holmes tale...
Review: The image of Sherlock Holmes in 'The Hound of the Baskervilles' is perhaps the most enduring image we have of him. You see, an Inverness cloak and deerstalker cap are inappropriate wardrobe for the town, and belong in the country. Sherlock Holmes is predominantly a city dweller and city investigator; it is relatively uncommon that he treks out on adventures, but the case of the mysterious death of Sir Charles Baskerville and the attempted murder of Sir Henry Baskerville led him to the Dartmoor plain. Thus, country garb was in order. This is where we get much of our imagery.
Also helping with this is that every major actor to play Holmes has considered 'Hound of the Baskervilles' to be the ultimate Holmes story to act -- rather like the Hamlet of Conan Doyle's work. Holmes was a popular film icon, and in the early decades of the twentieth century several dozen films were made of Holmes, but the first after these many films to be set in Victorian times (and not be updated for the screen) was a version of Hound. Ellie Norwood, Basil Rathbone, Peter Cushing, Jeremy Brett -- many distinguished actors have considered this among their greatest roles.
Watson dates the case to 1889, but various reading authorities, knowing the good doctor's occasional attempts to distort details to protect the privacy of the innocent, have dated this to between 1886 and 1900.
In fact, the novel appeared in serialised form in the Strand magazine, the great first-publication site of most Holmesian tales, between August 1901 and April 1902, after Conan Doyle had attempted to kill off the great detective in the short story The Final Problem, which showcased Holmes' battle with Moriarity, the Napoleon of Crime. In fact, Conan Doyle came to dislike the character of Holmes because it was a distraction to his other pursuits.
So, bowing to public pressure, Conan Doyle penned Hound of the Baskervilles to placate the public demand for more stories, but took care to place it before the death of Holmes, in the hopes that he could leave the detective safely dead (if not buried). Such was not to be, and we find a few years later that in fact Conan Doyle 'resurrects' Holmes in a rather ingenious fashion.
But, on to the story at hand. Holmes and Watson, at home at 221b Baker Street, are approached by a Dr. James Mortimer regarding the death of Sir Charles Baskerville and a family curse which involved evil forces in the form of a satanic hound. Mortimer is concerned for the safety of the new proprietor of the family lands, freshly arriving from Canada, who had a new boot stolen, then an old boot stolen, in his hotel in London. Later Holmes would put together the significance of this seeming strange minor act (no, I won't tell you).
Holmes sends Baskerville and Watson together to the country estate while he tends things in London on another case. In reality, Holmes is setting Watson up as a diversion, while he investigates the moor and the surroundings of the Baskerville estate under cover. Life at the estate is a bit strained, given the murder, an attempted murder, a curse, and all. The neighbours seem nice enough, though. Or are they? Watson picks up on curious little details of their relationship, which he reports back in written notes to Holmes (which have been redirected to his moor outpost).
Eventually Holmes reveals himself to Watson, and then to Baskerville, and the chase is on in earnest, to discover the reality of the mysterious creature each have seen or heard. In good mystery fashion, we come across long lost relatives and an inheritance to be had; we find plots and subplots muddied by superstitious belief and fear, on a mysterious plain in southwestern England.
All the elements combined that are now considered standard bits for a well-done country English mystery. But the mystery does not stop merely with the story. In true mystery fashion, appearing in the Daily Express edition of March 16, 1959, there were doubts cast upon the authorship of Hound of the Baskervilles. The one who carried the dispute was named none other than Baskerville, Harry Baskerville. He credited the story to one Fletcher Robinson, who died (perhaps of the Egyptian mummy's curse) at age 35 shortly after the publication of Hound. With his death, only Baskerville remembered the issue of co-authorship. Baskerville claims it was Robinson who 'borrowed' the Baskerville name.
One of Conan Doyle's heirs, Adrian Conan Doyle, heatedly denied involvement of Robinson past possible 'conversations' that might have taken place between Arthur Conan Doyle and Robinson. But, he did not deny Conan Doyle's possible 'inspiration' from Robinson.
One Baker Street Irregular (an exclusive club of Holmesian experts) was doing a monograph on this issue as well, claiming that the reason why Holmes appears so infrequently is due to the fact that he had to be written in to an otherwise essentially completed story. This Irregular travelled to meet with Baskerville, and hinted at discoveries he had found. But alas, the Irregular died three weeks later in America, his monograph never published and his notes were never found. Perhaps a dog ate the homework? A mysterious hound, perhaps?
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