Rating: 
Summary: really very good
Review: Having adored the original stories, I consume Holmes pastiches and am always on the look-out for one that meets my high expectations. A good pastiche has to feel like Conan Doyle wrote it. Many fail because they don't capture the essence of Holmes. Others fail because they diverge so far from any situation Conan Doyle could have contemplated that they feel like they're breaking the rules. This set of nine stories gets Holmes just right -- brilliant, arrogant, and surprising. And the stories dovetail, so far as I could tell, perfectly with the canon. Many of the characters and places in this pastiche are ones Conan Doyle alluded to in the original stories. I'm grateful that someone has so competently and colorfully fleshed them out. I've rated it four stars simply because five should be reserved for the real McCoy.
Rating: 
Summary: Too Much of Author's Detailed Knowledge of India and Nepal
Review: I've been a long-time fan of Sherlock Holmes mysteries and have read all of Conan Doyle's stories--some several times. The Original Casebook of Sherlock Holmes looked promising when I browsed through it in the book store. The author captures Holmes' style and rhythm of speaking just fine. However, the author is an academic expert on the history and cultures of India and Nepal and suffocates each story with more tedious detail about these countries than the great majority of Holmes fans could ever want to know. Since each story is "as told to Watson by Holmes", there is no involvement of Watson in the stories. Holmes simply recounts his Lone Ranger episodes to Watson. The pacing and threading of each mystery simply gets buried under the avalanche of things few want to know about India and Nepal. I stopped reading half way through the fifth story (of nine stories) and gave up. I no longer could stand the tedium. My sense of the book is that the author was far more interested in telling you arcane things about India and Nepal than writing crisp, tight mysteries.
Rating: 
Summary: The Real Holmes revealed - the real voice of Conan Doyle!
Review: Like a trip to Nepal and India, with the Scotland Yard sleuth as good as ever, very mysterious and always knowledgable. I really enoyed the "otherness" of these places and people. Some of the tales reminded me of Kipling's India, especially the backdrop of the great game. I kept waiting for Kim to show up! Sherlock was inscrutable as ever, but also there was something caring about him that made him more interesting. One thing though: I think the villian IS Moriarty, not the brother!
Anyone who doesn't like this book has read too many knock-offs and not the real thing!
Rating:
Summary: Holmes Lives!
Review: Not only is he alive, but Professor Riccardi has captured the idiosyncrasies, brilliance and enthusiasm of the beloved literary figure without missing a beat.The nine exotic tales of Holmes's unusual escapades in late nineteen century Asia are described in exquisite detail. It soon becomes apparent to the reader that Riccardi has spent much serious time in this part of the world.
Once drawn into the first episode, the reader can't wait to savor the next. Before I knew it, I reached the end and was aching for more. Characters and places are real and what is truly remarkable is the way the author has combined his knowledge of religion, philosophy, geography, history and language to spin the "Oriental Casebook" stories into a delightful read.
Whether or not you're a fan of the "world's greatest detective," this collection of clever stories is wonderful. "An Envoy to Lhasa," my favorite, should become a classic short story.
I can't wait until my granddaughter, a Harry Potter fan, is older so she can read the book, an old atlas in hand, following Holmes's travelogue. She'll have a great time.
Rating:
Summary: Beam me up, Scotty, there's no intelligent life down here!
Review: Not to be overtly critical, after all, I have published well over 100 poems and won a short-story contest myself so I know writing isn't easy, but did this author ever actually read the Holmes cannon? As I have noted in other reviews, you can disguise the man, the voice, take an alias, change to some exotic locale, but you can never lose focus that this is Sherlock Holmes you are writing about, and that means observation and deduction. This book paints a pretty background, but the main character is very out of place in it. The Holmes of this book could have never visited forbidden Tibet, because his bumbling would have given him away. And that's not the Holmes I have grown to appreciate. If you want to read about Holmes in Tibet, I suggest The Mandala of Sherlock Holmes or its alternate hardcover Sherlock Holmes: The Missing Years. And now, if you'll excuse me, I have to beam up before I grow stiff from boredom.
Rating:
Summary: best new Holmes I've read
Review: These nine stories are delightful. Ted Riccardi fills the void left after Holmes disappeared at Reichenbach Falls with vivid accounts of Holmes' exploits in Tibet, British India, and Dutch Indonesia. Characters like Captain Fantome and the Regent of Tibet are compelling; the scenes of decaying colonial empires are memorable. Riccardi matches Arthur Conan Doyle's style so well that I honestly flirted with the idea that his explanation of the stories' provenance might be true. If there's any shortcoming of the stories, it is that Watson couldn't be there along the way and retells them only upon Holmes' return.
Rating:
Summary: best new Holmes I've read
Review: These nine stories are delightful. Ted Riccardi fills the void left after Holmes disappeared at Reichenbach Falls with vivid accounts of Holmes' exploits in Tibet, British India, and Dutch Indonesia. Characters like Captain Fantome and the Regent of Tibet are compelling; the scenes of decaying colonial empires are memorable. Riccardi matches Arthur Conan Doyle's style so well that I honestly flirted with the idea that his explanation of the stories' provenance might be true. If there's any shortcoming of the stories, it is that Watson couldn't be there along the way and retells them only upon Holmes' return.
Rating:
Summary: ted riccardi
Review: this was one of the ver best pastiches i've read. each separate chapter was a mini story in itself, but each is a thread in an overall tapestry. while this is the first holmes pastiche that riccardi has written, we can only hope it's not the last.
Rating:
Summary: ted riccardi
Review: this was one of the ver best pastiches i've read. each separate chapter was a mini story in itself, but each is a thread in an overall tapestry. while this is the first holmes pastiche that riccardi has written, we can only hope it's not the last.
Rating: 
Summary: The Oriental Casebook of Sherlock Holmes
Review: To say that I was very disappointed is an understatement. As an advid reader of mysteries and a great admirer of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's work, this book was a waste of my time and money. There have been other authors who have created additional works of ledgendary characters such as Robert Parker writing Philip Marlowe stories and actually pulling it off. But at no point in this book did Riccardi show true knowledge of the Sherlock Holmes character. The author is a professor of Middle East cultures and if he was writing a history or fact book on the subject that would have been fine. Instead, what we have is a historical/cultural textbook with a sprinkle of the Holmes and Watson characters and simplistic mysteries that are so obvious that any mystery lover could solve them without Holmes' genius. [...] These are short stories that drone on and on, giving you enormous background which is simply filler for those subpar "cases" that Holmes painstakingly solves. Though some of the short stories were better then others, this book does not intrigue a true Sherlock Holmes lover to keep on reading. Riccardi gives a wealth of information (and it would be great if we were going to be tested on it), but his lack of understanding Holmes and Watson is clearly present from beginning to end. It disheartens me to read a book about one of the greatest detectives that ever graced the pages of literature to be reduced to a cheap dime-store character in mediocore storylines and boring premises. Riccardi's desperate attempts to captivate the reader was unsuccessful. Even Holmes and Watson would consider this book criminal.
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