I had this on my list of new release books to watch out for this year but didn’t actually realise it was due for release so early in the year and the first I knew of it being released was when it popped up on the new additions shelf at the library. Result!

It was pretty slow in the beginning and after a handful of chapters I was idly wondering if my enthusiasm was misplaced. But then it all started to come to life. One thread of the story has Mary Russell, nursing a badly sprained ankle in a rural France, translating a coded journal she has found. The other thread has Holmes running off elsewhere in France looking for his missing son - the son King created for him and Irene Adler previously in this series. I love it when the two threads start to throw up clues that the reader can see and put together before either of the detectives can.

There’s many, if not all, the classic hallmarks of a Holmes story here, and all the ones that make a good Russell plot as well. I like how the Holmes universe has been extended and this was the first one for a while that made me want to go back and read Conan Doyle again as well.