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THE SINGULAR ADVENTURES OF MR SHERLOCK HOLMES

The third edition of this well-received collection of Sherlock Holmes short stories. Sherlock Magazine called the original edition “One of the best collections of Holmes pastiches for some time”.

Other critics have remarked how the author hits off the Watsonian idiom with remarkable accuracy: “The stories look like being from the pen of John H Watson himself”.

This new edition contains a total of seventeen unusual, bizarre and thoroughly intriguing tales written in the classic manner.

SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE SINGULAR ADVENTURE OF THE GLOVED PIANIST

The year is 1906, Queen Victoria has been dead these last five years and in the streets of London the hansom cab is giving way to the motor car.

In the USA the Wright brothers have taken to the air and everywhere machinery is replacing craftsmanship.

The time and place is still the world of Holmes and Watson as the aging pair eagerly advance into the beginning of the 20th century and are thrust into the investigation of a murder that would have been impossible only a few years earlier.

MR DICKENS AND MASTER BETTY

Charles Dickens, the nascent novelist, is employed to write the life story of the former infant prodigy Master Betty known as Young Roscius.

Dickens, a self-proclaimed “delver into the human soul”, clashes with his employer’s overweening arrogance and revenges himself by unearthing the hidden truths lurking in the older man’s psyche.

The story tells of two teenage boys, both with feckless spendthrift fathers. One scrapes a miserable existence in a boot-blacking factory for six shillings a week; the other earns fifty guineas a night idolised by the highest in the land.

MATCHBOX PUPPETS

This delightful collection of easy-to-make puppets will be a boon to all parents, teachers and entertainers of children. The puppets are based on an ordinary household-size matchbox which enables them to have opening mouths. The pages are designed to photocopy on to A4 card, cut out and colour as fancy takes.

With a choice of some sixty different characters there is something for all ages and abilities in these simple but clever constructions. The collection varies widely from a simple flower to the Minotaur, a whale to Henry VIII, octopus to Roman emperor, and a selection of characters which can be topical at different periods of the year – turnip lantern, Easter bunny, scarecrow, Father Christmas etc.

"Fantastic resource. They're great!"

FINDING SAMPSON PENLEY

Sampson Penley founded his theatre company in the last decade of the 18th century and built up a circuit of provincial theatres mainly in Kent and Sussex.

His was the first troupe to visit the continent after the defeat of Napoleon, and he headed the first English actors to play in Paris since Elizabethan times.

The father of seven children who all became actors or managers themselves, Penley, forced into bankruptcy in 1822, ended his days selling potted shrimps.

The book, covering a half-century and two generations of the Penley family, is a fascinating read.

"This well-produced volume . . . is a real eye-opener."
British Theatre Guide

"A very full picture of the life of one family's involvement with the theatre . . . sympathetically and with not a little humour put into the context of its times." The Journal of Kent History

THE SINGULAR EXPLOITS OF MR SHERLOCK HOLMES

Alan Stockwell’s first collection of Sherlock Holmes stories garnered much praise from aficionados when first published in 2003 and is now in its third edition.

In response to many requests, he now offers a collection of ten new Sherlock Holmes stories told in the authentic manner.

Here you will find the dreadful ordeal of Oscar Wilde, the escape of the wild wolves, and the Surrey man-monkey among the tales. And Dr Watson at last reveals the long-hidden secret of the politician, the lighthouse, and the trained cormorant.

"The author's stories are notable for their clever and imaginative surprising twists."

"The setting is true to the period, and the plots are inventive."

"Good, I like it. Very interesting reading for a fan."