The Valley of Fear by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (free via Project Gutenburg!)

According to some critics, this is Doyle’s best story.  Well, some critics are dolts.  I don’t know if people assume that a writer’s last novel is always his/her best, or if the jump in narrative is seen as kooky or inventive.  I’m not saying the book is bad–it’s not.  It’s just not as good as other Holmes stories.  It has some errors common to insufficiently edited material: Holmes names Moriarty as the ringleader, despite the fact that Moriarty is already dead according to the timeline of the series; Moriarty is never successfully connected to the story; the initial storyline seems like a flimsy excuse to expose the flashback storyline.  So no, not Doyle’s best.

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