My latest Sherlock Holmes short story, The Witch of Ellenby, will appear in Volume XVIII of the MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories, which is being published as a set of three volumes, XVI to XVIII. The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories is the world’s largest collection of Sherlock Holmes stories, and the theme of the stories in the latest three volumes is Whatever Remains… Must Be The Truth. This means that the stories must have a supernatural element, but the mystery must have a mundane explanation. The collection contains forewords from Sherlockian author Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Roger Johnson of the Sherlock Holmes Society of London.
All of the stories in this collection are cannonical pastiches, which means that they are written in the style of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s original stories. The Witch of Ellenby is set in 1899. The majority of the action takes place in the village of Ellenby, in England’s beautiful Lakes District, where Holmes and Watson have been summoned to investigate a case of witchcraft. Steve Emecz of MX Publishing recently interviewed me about my contributions to the series and about my Natalie McMasters Mysteries (available on this website on The Books tab).
The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories is the brainchild of its editor, David Marcum, one of the world’s leading Sherlockians. In 2015, he wanted to create a new collection traditional Holmes stories in Conan Doyle’s original format, and partnered with MX Publishing to do so. The decision was taken to donate all of the royalties from the project to the Stepping Stones School for special needs children, housed at Conan Doyle’s former residence, Undershaw. As with previous volumes, all the royalties from the collection are being donated to Stepping Stones .
The new books are currently available for pre-order at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mxpublishing/mx-book-of-new-sherlock-holmes-stories-vols-xvi-to-xviii) in hardback, paperback or electronic format until 5 September 2019. You are encouraged to pre-order, because this will help the publisher to defray publication and shipping costs. The three volumes will be published in October.