Death on a Pale Horse: Sherlock Holmes on Her Majesty's Secret Service (Pegasus Crime)
Thomas’ latest Sherlock Holmes novel finds the great detective hot on the trail of a criminal mastermind almost as dangerous as Professor Moriarty, Colonel Rawdon Moran, formerly of the British Army, whose plot to acquire gold and diamond mines in southern Africa involves manufacturing a war designed to bring Britain to its knees. A fellow whose maniacal scheme rivals that of your typical James Bond villain (the book’s subtitle, Sherlock Holmes on Her Majesty’s Secret Service, makes an obvious Bond reference), Moran is a worthy adversary for Holmes, a fiendishly clever foe with a seemingly limitless capacity for evil. But Holmes, of course, has his own weapon, his powerful intellect (and, in this case, that of his brilliant brother, Mycroft, too), and he demonstrates once again why he always comes out on top. Thomas, who’s written a handful of Holmes stories, does an excellent job of re-creating the feel of Conan Doyle’s originals—Dr. Watson’s first-person narration is particularly spot-on—while looking at Holmes from fresh angles. A fine addition to the voluminous Holmes-after-Doyle literature. --David Pitt