Rating: 
Summary: The Game's Afoot!
Review: One of my all-time favorite Sherlock Holmes pastiches, and the one that started the revival of interest in Sherlock Holmes in the 1970's.Watson tricks Holmes into going to Vienna to get cured of his cocaine habit by Sigmund Freud. While there, Holmes becomes involved in a case involving one of Freud's patients. Soon, "The Game is Afoot!," and a recovering Holmes, Watson, and Dr. Freud are off to solve the mystery. Can't recommend this highly enough, and also recommend the movie based on the book.
Rating: 
Summary: Reasonable explanation for Holmeses Hiatus
Review: Sherlock Holmes severely addicted to cocaine is lead by Watson to Dr. Freud to cure. Not a bad story as far as books go, but it would depend how loyal one is to the original canon if they personally like it or not. I'm slight ambivalent about it. It was okay, I guess.
Rating:
Summary: Watson, My Good Man...
Review: THE SEVEN-PER-CENT SOLUTION is a story unparalleled in the annals of criminal detection. Discovered in Hampshire, England, where it had lain neglected since 1939, then painstakingly researched and annotated for two years by editor Nicholas Meyer, THE SEVEN-PER-CENT SOLUTION marks the first publication of a heretofore unknown and astounding episode in the career of Sherlock Holmes as recorded by his closest friend and chronicler, Dr. John H. Watson. Even more remarkable than the historic discovery of Watson's transcript are the revelations it contains concerning the real identity of the heinous Professor Moriarity, the dark secret shared by Sherlock and brother Mycroft Holmes, and the detective's true whereabouts and activities during the Great Hiatus when the world believed him dead. Most astounding of all, THE SEVEN-PER-CENT SOLUTION details the events that led to the meeting in Vienna of the world's two most brilliant investigators and their collaboration on a sensational case of diabolic conspiracy. John Hamish Watson was born in England in 1847. After a childhood spent abroad, he returned in 1872 and enrolled in the University of London Medical School, where he took his degree six years later. After finishing the course at Netley prescribed for Army surgeons, he was attached to the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers and sent to India. Severly wounded by a Jezail bullet at the Battle of Maiwand during the Second Afghan War, in 1880, he returned to England, his health ruined, with no specific plans other than to live as best he could on his Army pension. In January of the following year, quite by accident, he met Sherlock Holmes, who was then looking for someone to share his lodgings. The ensuing friendship, which lasted until Holmes' death found Watson his niche as the great detective's biographer through more than sixty cases. In his spare time he resumed the practice of medicine. In 1889 he married Mary Morstan. He died in Britain in 1940.
Rating:
Summary: Watson, My Good Man...
Review: THE SEVEN-PER-CENT SOLUTION is a story unparalleled in the annals of criminal detection. Discovered in Hampshire, England, where it had lain neglected since 1939, then painstakingly researched and annotated for two years by editor Nicholas Meyer, THE SEVEN-PER-CENT SOLUTION marks the first publication of a heretofore unknown and astounding episode in the career of Sherlock Holmes as recorded by his closest friend and chronicler, Dr. John H. Watson. Even more remarkable than the historic discovery of Watson's transcript are the revelations it contains concerning the real identity of the heinous Professor Moriarity, the dark secret shared by Sherlock and brother Mycroft Holmes, and the detective's true whereabouts and activities during the Great Hiatus when the world believed him dead. Most astounding of all, THE SEVEN-PER-CENT SOLUTION details the events that led to the meeting in Vienna of the world's two most brilliant investigators and their collaboration on a sensational case of diabolic conspiracy. John Hamish Watson was born in England in 1847. After a childhood spent abroad, he returned in 1872 and enrolled in the University of London Medical School, where he took his degree six years later. After finishing the course at Netley prescribed for Army surgeons, he was attached to the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers and sent to India. Severly wounded by a Jezail bullet at the Battle of Maiwand during the Second Afghan War, in 1880, he returned to England, his health ruined, with no specific plans other than to live as best he could on his Army pension. In January of the following year, quite by accident, he met Sherlock Holmes, who was then looking for someone to share his lodgings. The ensuing friendship, which lasted until Holmes' death found Watson his niche as the great detective's biographer through more than sixty cases. In his spare time he resumed the practice of medicine. In 1889 he married Mary Morstan. He died in Britain in 1940.
Rating: 
Summary: The right sort of pastiche
Review: There are two sorts of Sherlock Holmes pastiche. The first is written by people who like the original stories and wish there were more of them; so they try to duplicate them, to surreptitiously insert an extra bit of short fiction into the canon. If a writer does this and no more the result will almost certainly be a failure. (This is contingent. It would be nice if there were more Sherolock Holmes stories, and it would be nice if someone could practice direct mimickry; but no-one can.) Conan Doyle himself was reduced to doing this sort of thing by the 1920s, and the results were pallid. But there is another way. The original stories, as we all know, are peppered with oddities, allusions to untold events, and, more than anything else, flat contradictions. A good pastiche will make a meal of the oddities, fill out the allusions, and, in this case, explain away the contradictions. A good pastiche does not merely augment, but also extends, what has gone before. So consider "The Final Problem" and "The Valley of Fear". In the former story Holmes mentions - for the first time - the criminal mastermind of all London, Professor Moriarty, who in the end dies. In "The Valley of Fear" Holmes mentions Moriarty as still living, and Watson and Lestrade speak as if Holmes talks about Moriarty all the time. A contradiction right away. Moreover, one would think that "The Napoleon of Crime" would feature more prominently in Watson's tales about London's greatest detective. Moreover still, a penetrating analysis by a good friend of mine reveals the the apparently solid "The Final Problem" to be one of the most ludicrous Holmes stories in existence. Meyer solves all this by supposing Holmes's cocaine addiction (mentioned in "The Sign of Four") generated paranoid delusions about the perfectly harmless Moriarty; which, of course, necessitates a meeting with Dr. Sigmund Freud. (I have no doubt that Freud in this novel is totally unlike the real Freud, but criticims based on this fact are misguided. Meyer's Freud is exactly the sort of man who inhabits the Sherlock Holmes universe.) Meyer's solution to Moriarty ought to be made official. The novel suffers from a lack of real meat when Holmes gets around to detecting again, and the kind of climax which looks ahead to the film version rather than behind to the nineteenth century. But all in all, THE pastiche to read.
Rating: 
Summary: Weak plot, a travesty to the canon
Review: This book betrays the Sherlock Holmes people know and respect. In this tale, Holmes is reduced to a semi-deranged cocaine addict in desperate need of mental help. The amount of plot in this book is about the same as one of Doyle's short stories. A tacked-on chase sequence at the end seems out of place, but since the author is a screenwriter, it is perhaps not surprising. But the worst of all is this, revealed right at the start of the book: Professor Moriarty, Holmes' most dangerous enemy in the real stories, is reduced here to a meek, ordinary schoolteacher. What a ridiculous and depressing idea! I kept waiting for the real Moriarty to show up, but no. Meyer's Holmes has no brilliant enemy to challenge him, just a boring cocaine addiction. I am surprised the owners of the Sherlock Holmes trademark approved this book.
Rating:
Summary: an excellent Sherlock Holmes pastiche
Review: This book is an appalling failure. Sherlock Holmes, cocaine addict, meets Freud. The book is not only boring but it does an extremely poor job of bringing Holmes to life. That's really all I have to say about the book. The novel is really not even worth the time it has taken to write these few sentences. I just did it to warn you off this travesty. If you're a Sherlock Holmes fan this book might even make you mad.
Rating: 
Summary: A Travesty
Review: This book is an appalling failure. Sherlock Holmes, cocaine addict, meets Freud. The book is not only boring but it does an extremely poor job of bringing Holmes to life. That's really all I have to say about the book. The novel is really not even worth the time it has taken to write these few sentences. I just did it to warn you off this travesty. If you're a Sherlock Holmes fan this book might even make you mad.
Rating:
Summary: 100% success
Review: This book was a wonderful theory of the cause of the Great Hiatus. Watson is a believable, intelligent doctor, and is shown as more of a pillar for Holmes than a mere habit. We see more emotion and strength that has ever been seen before in Holmes. The best line? "I want you to know that I did not mean it. Do you hear me? I did not mean it. I remember distinctly calling you Iscariot. Will you forgive me for that monstrous calumny? Will you?" This story will make you laugh and cry. It is a must for any Holmes fan.
Rating:
Summary: 100% success
Review: This book was a wonderful theory of the cause of the Great Hiatus. Watson is a believable, intelligent doctor, and is shown as more of a pillar for Holmes than a mere habit. We see more emotion and strength that has ever been seen before in Holmes. The best line? "I want you to know that I did not mean it. Do you hear me? I did not mean it. I remember distinctly calling you Iscariot. Will you forgive me for that monstrous calumny? Will you?" This story will make you laugh and cry. It is a must for any Holmes fan.
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