Book Beginnings: Holmes Entangled

Holmes Entangled, by Gordon McAlpine (Seventh Street Books, March 2018). These are the first lines from the book's Prologue:

Buenos Aires, Argentina, 1943
Sr. J.L. Borges, 44, has completed his shift at the ill-organized Miguel Cané Municipal Library near the city center, where he works as first assistant.

About the Book:

Sherlock Holmes, now in his seventies, retired from investigations and peaceably disguised as a professor at Cambridge, is shaken when a modestly successful author in his late-sixties named Arthur Conan Doyle calls upon him at the university. This Conan Doyle, notable for historical adventure stories, science fiction, and a three-volume history of the Boer War (but no detective tales), somehow knows of the false professor’s true identity and pleads for investigative assistance. Someone is trying to kill Conan Doyle. Who? Why? Good questions, but what intrigues Holmes most is how the “middling scribbler” ascertained Holmes’s identity in the first place, despite the detective’s perfect disguise. Holmes takes the case. 

There is danger every step of the way. Great powers want the investigation quashed. But with the assistance of Dr. Watson’s widow, Holmes persists, exploring séances, the esoterica of Edgar Allan Poe, the revolutionary new science of quantum mechanics, and his own long-denied sense of loss and solitude. 

Ultimately, even Sherlock Holmes is unprepared for what the evidence suggests.

Initial Thoughts:

Well, I have to admit that's not the most thrilling of openings. But a book about Sherlock Holmes, libraries, séances, Edgar Allan Poe, and Jorge Luis Borges definitely gets my interest up. Looking forward to getting started on this one.

Rose City Reader hosts Book Beginnings on Friday.  As she says, the idea is to post the first sentence (or so) of the book you're currently reading, along with any first impressions or thoughts you have about the book, the author, etc.  It's a wonderful way of adding new books to your must-read list, and a chance to connect with other readers and bloggers.