by Narrelle M Harris
Publisher: Clan Destine Press, March 2024
Publisher’s blurb:
In Narrelle M Harris‘ She-Wolf of Baker Street, Audrey Hudson takes the lead in this contemporary, paranormal take on the residents of Baker Street.
After Sherlock Holmes “rescues” Audrey Hudson from a kidnapper, she offers him her upstairs flat in exchange for solving the unsolved murder of her family in Edinburgh. Sherlock’s being forced to theorise without data, however – he doesn’t know his new landlady and her late family are werewolves.
There’s a lot he doesn’t know about his attractive new flatmate, John Watson, too.
Momentum is added to the case as Sherlock’s investigations suggest a much bigger mystery is at play, involving a disturbing case on Dartmoor with a Greek interpreter; Sherlock’s agoraphobic sister, Myca; Audrey’s long-dead love, Ruby Stockton; and the fate of Great Britain’s mystic heart.
Will Holmes be able to unravel the mysteries that have haunted Audrey’s life? And can Audrey protect her new pack, or is she about to lose those she loves once again to unknown enemies?
Review
by Ashleigh Meikle
The She-Wolf of Baker Street is a unique take on the Sherlock Holmes stories. filled with cryptids, myths, crime, and mystery. But the crime is not that straightforward, and Mrs Hudson – Audrey in this story, is in control of the narrative.
Cryptids, queer people, disabled people, and people of all races are also key elements in this book, where the diversity of the cast seamlessly melds into the story, and allows each character from Audrey to Sherlock, to Nick and Myca – Sherlock’s sister –to shine individually as they investigate the murders of Audrey’s pack in Edinburgh. This leads them down a dark road of cryptid hunters and cryptid artefact collectors, determined to eradicate the world of people like Audrey.
I found this to be an interesting spin on the traditional Sherlock Holmes stories, using the tropes of the originals alongside queer representation and cryptids to create something unique and give the characters their own voices, complications, and struggles alongside the mystery and intrigue that always sits well with a good Sherlock Holmes retelling like this one. I enjoyed that the traditional characters were at home in a modern and paranormal world; in fact, I think it’s the kind of world that suits a quirky character like Sherlock Holmes quite well. Each relationship in this book has its ups and downs as discoveries are made and truths come out – but to me, this is what made it work so well. It allowed them to be human and fail when nothing came easily to any of them, making sure that they all had their demons to grapple with – literally and figuratively. Tension built as this unlikely crime-solving crew gathered information and evidence to find out what – or who – was behind the crimes in Edinburgh, and the mysteries in the cryptid world.
Like any good crime novel, there are good guys – our diverse, intrepid crew of humans and cryptids, bad guys who threaten their very existence, and then those who live in the grey areas, for whom morals go out the window when they are threatened. As I read, and each character revealed the truth about themselves, the wariness that some felt for a range of reasons: Audrey because of what had happened to her pack, Sherlock because he didn’t know what to expect, and the others because of various things that had happened to them in the past – I could understand their early hesitation. Trust was a key theme here, where everyone had to learn to trust their new family, their found family, so they could work together.
When all of this came together, this was a compelling novel. I have read and watched many iterations of Sherlock Holmes, and each one has something unique, whilst still maintaining the qualities people love about the original stories, about what has made them so enduring over the years. And as someone who has studied and is fascinated by mythology, I found that this unique Holmesian adventure was brilliantly executed, allowing ancient and modern words to come to life as part of the Holmesian cannon of literature that has captured the imaginations of many since the stories were first published.