The Complete Sherlock Holmes Volume 1

I recently read The Complete Sherlock Holmes Volume 1 by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The genre of this book (I must say, if you don't know the genre of a Sherlock Holmes book, something is seriously wrong.) is obviously mystery. For those of you who don't know, Sherlock Holmes is a brilliant detective who has yet to have a case in which he couldn't solve. His close and only friend, John Watson accompanies him on most of his mysteries.

            As for a summary of the book, seeing as it is a collection of books, I will give a basic outline of his methods of solving his mysteries. To begin, if there's one thing that Holmes is best known for, it's his deductive reasoning. Upon a single glance, Holmes is able to completely read you. In the story A study in Scarlet when Holmes first meets Watson, he is able to tell he came from Afghanistan, simply by the way he greeted him, and his physical appearance.

Though Holmes may be the most intelligent man to ever of lived, it is very interesting to know that any information that he is not using in a case, he doesn't bother to learn. I.e. Holmes didn't know, and didn't want to know, that the Earth rotated around the sun. What really astonished me about this was the fact that Doyle was able to show such realism to his character. It's almost amazing to think that Doyle could show that Holmes was still human in a sense. Doyle didn't make him a mindless robot that knows everything, he showed that no human, no matter how brilliant, could know and understand everything.

            No matter who you are these books will make you feel stupid. One of the most distinctive traits about Holmes is that he ALWAYS makes thing seem so obvious, no matter how complicated they actually are. When Holmes unravels the mystery, I almost always would say: “Aw! How did I not notice that!?!” Though one the other hand, you almost feel smarter, as if you’ve learned from reading these books. I defiantly feel more intelligent after reading a story of Doyle’s.

            All in all, no matter which story you read, you will be in for a treat. Doyle’s style of writing makes it so easy to get sucked into a book. Also, because they’re short stories, the story becomes exciting almost instantly. A+