Rating: Not for me

Reading Level: High School

I loved some of the Sherlock storeis I read in my youth, but there are some serious red flags.

Serious Concerns:

  • Substance Abuse. Holmes is described as “altering from week to week between cocaine and ambition, the drowsiness of the drug, and the fierce energy of his own keen nature.” That isn’t the only reference to substance use: a friend is addicted to opium; Sherlock smokes a pipe, uses snuff, and doesn’t deny using opium too. A detailed list of the substance use is given at the end of this review.
  • Awful characters. Fathers who murder or enslave their daughters for money are among the worst. There was also an insane nightmarish tale where an engineer was almost (purposely) crushed to death by a large machine. Other crimes are less severe: bank robberies, tales of lovers disappearing,  deceit, blackmail, etc.
  • Sexism. Sherlock displays general distaste for women. To heartily respect a woman as an intelligent equal is his exception, not the rule.
  • Use of the term “slut.” “He was urging his son to marry my daughter with as little regard for what she might think as if she were a slut from off the streets.” (The Boscombe Valley)
  • The KKK appears in The Five Orange Pips chapter.

I would only recommend this book only for the most mature readers. If you are looking for just one chapter that is fun for a young or more innocent audience, I’d recommend “The Red Headed League,” although it does involve minor gunfire and a short debrief including discussion over a glass of whiskey.

Because this is such a classic, I took detailed notes of some other points that could be of issue:

  • Sherlock is described as disrespecting (even sneering) at love. He sees love as a distracting factor. (A Scandal in Bohemia )
  • Sherlock alternates from week to week between cocaine and ambition (A Scandal in Bohemia.)
  • Sherlock turns to smoking his pipe to help him think. He calls one particular mystery a “three-pipe problem.”
  • When Sherlock proves Watson wrong he says, “take a pinch of snuff, Doctor, and acknowledge I have scored over you…”
  • At one point Watson finds Sherlock half-asleep with “a formidable array of bottles and test-tubes, with the pungent and cleanly smell of hydrochloric acid” indicating Sherlock had spent the day with his chemicals. I’m not sure if he was just exploring the science of chemistry or was abusing substances as he does elsewhere. (A case of Identity) Again, all-night of stooping over test-tubes (science or drugs?) (The Copper Beeches)
  • “Light a cigar, and let me expound.” (The Boscombe Valley Mystery)
  • “…Self-poisonerby cocaine and tobacco.”(The Five Orange Pips)
  • One character is addicted to opium. He uses an opium den in the city.  The book also states he participated in orgies and came home each day twisted and shattered. Now I don’t know the details of what was included in the orgies but either way it sounds quite unhealthy.  At one point Watson enters the opium den and observes a sad state of “bodies lying in strange and fantastic poses, heads thrown back,” etc. “Most lay silent” but some “muttered to themselves”… I suppose this could initiate a good conversation about the awful effects of substance abuse. At any rate, Watson finds Sherlock there, who never denies that he has added opium-smoking habits to his cocaine injections. (The Man with the Twisted Lip)
  • After solving a difficult mystery Sherlock says he solved this one by “consuming an ounce of shag.”(The Man with the Twisted Lip)
  • At one point a desperate man who has been found out of his crime shrieks, “for God’s sake have mercy!…. I never will again. I swear it. I’ll swear it on a Bible… For Christ’s sake don’t (bring it into court)!” Later Sherlock let’s him off easy and says, “ I suppose I am committing a felony, but it is just possible that I am saving a soul.” (The Blue Carbuncle.)
  • Sherlock admits to hoping one day for a worldwide country that unites the U.S. and England.