Well folks, here we are again–time for Grey Havens YA to start ANOTHER book– its third book to be exact. Can you believe it? This time around, we are not reading a book, but a collection of short stories about Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes. 

At our last book meeting, we discussed our first story: “A Study in Scarlet.” We kicked things off with an essay put together by a mother-daughter duo from our group about how Sherlock Holmes was a nerd like us. He saw the world in a way other people did not, and this gave him an almost superhero like quality. His stories definitely fit the bill for Grey Havens YA, where it’s not about what you love, but how you love it.

We decided that Sherlock just had to fangirl with somebody, so it’s a good thing he found Watson.

We also wondered if perhaps Watson was just a puzzle Sherlock wanted to figure out… We will be exploring that idea as we continue on to “The Crooked Man” and beyond. I also challenged the YA’s to let go of previous conceptions about the character. Steven Moffat in the present day will tell us that Sherlock Holmes is a “high-functioning sociopath,” and therefore his behaviors can be traced back to some kind of differing mental state than the rest of us… But what did Doyle in the late 19th century really say about his strange new detective character?

We also had a fascinating conversation about the pros and cons of being Sherlock Holmes and whether or not we would want to take his place.

One of our members said, “Yes, I’d like to be Sherlock Holmes….if I had an off switch.”

Another said, “No– I want to be Watson!”

What about you? Please send us an owl with your thoughts on Sherlock Holmes. Did you finish A Study in Scarlet? What did you think?