As a great many other mystery bloggers have already pointed out today, this is the 154th anniversary of the birth of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes. The Holmes stories - just 4 novels and 56 short stories - are truly "elementary" in the sense of being "elemental": they are the building blocks on which much of today's mystery fiction rests.
Perhaps you're a relative newcomer to mysteries. Perhaps you know Holmes best from the movies and/or television series. That's fine - but I hope that what you see will convince you to try the original stories. They remain extremely readable.
I came to mysteries through reading all the Holmes stories when I was 10 years old, and I still reread them periodically - in fact, I'm about due for another go-around. In any case, I hope you'll pause, raise your favorite beverage in a toast to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, to Sherlock Holmes, and to mystery.
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