Start a story by Conan Doyle and you cannot stop reading, whether you are ten or sixty.
-Michael Dirda
The immense talent, passion and literary brilliance that Conan Doyle brought to his work gives him a unique place in English letters. -Stephen Fry
Arthur Conan Doyle’s Tales of Terror and Mystery (1922) is a haunting collection of twelve stories that highlights his extraordinary skills of storytelling. The first six stories are bloodcurdling tales of horror, and includes the macabre classic The New Catacomb . The last six stories, closer in form to the Sherlock Holmes work, includes the classic railroad mystery, The Lost Special .
One of the stand-out works in the entire collection is The Horror of the Heights ; in a story that straddles both the science fiction and horror genres, the journals of a missing pilot reveal the existence of terrifying creatures that lurk in the upper atmosphere.
The New Catacomb , in Doyle’s tribute to Edgar Allan Poe, tells the revenge story of two rival archeologists as they sink deeper into an endless Roman catacomb. In the evocative story The Lost Special , a train has mysteriously disappeared without trace between two stations. When the only evidence of the enigma is the dead body of the locomotive driver, the local newspaper becomes a platform to solve the mystery. The intrigue of speculation and reasoning is on par with the best of the Sherlock Holmes adventures.
Tense, disturbing, and dark, these stories will keep readers captivated until the final page. Other stories included are: The Leather Funnel , The Case of Lady Sannox , The Terror of Blue John Gap , The Brazilian Cat , The Beetle-Hunter , The Man with the Watches , The Japanned Box , The Black Doctor , and The Jew’s Breastplate .
With an eye-catching new cover, and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Tales of Terror and Mystery is both modern and readable.
