rukistarsailor's review
4.0
"The Great Detective" is a sequel to the short story "The Ghost of Cwmlech Manor." While I didn't enjoy "The Great Detective" as much as the previous story, it was still cute and fluffy.
thomcat's review
4.0
Steampunk short story, freely found online. Two (or three) main characters (also available in an earlier story) visit Mycroft Holmes, Watson and Sherlock can't be far behind. Quite cute, and well written.
pezski's review
3.0
A clever steampunk story where Sherlock Holmes is an automaton built by Mycroft. Sherman plots it well and the tale is filled with overt and subtle Holmes references, and the whole is quite light. For me, much of the English-ism - and Welsh-ism - sounded a little twee; for the latter, somewhat heavy on the "look you"s and sentence construction that verges on the Yoda-esque.
arkron's review
2.0
Full review at my blog.
The novelette reflects the contemporary futuristic discussion of human rights and artificial intelligence - of course, our current A.I. systems are not self-aware, yet, and this problem is as far away as wondering about overpopulation of Mars. One miss in the story is that it doesn't touch Robot ethics, i.e. the risks coming along with robots, at all: Everything about mechanics is happy sunshine and working absurdely perfect. That is another problem with the story that I have: I didn't buy into the steampunk logic at all, as the pure technological background is so far away from believability that I only could consider it as pure fantasy.
The scenery and atmosphere was beautifully described. Characters remain distant, and do some behavioural jumps which I simply didn't understand, e.g. Tacy's love story. The logic of the detective story was somewhat far-fetched and has some holes.
The novelette reflects the contemporary futuristic discussion of human rights and artificial intelligence - of course, our current A.I. systems are not self-aware, yet, and this problem is as far away as wondering about overpopulation of Mars. One miss in the story is that it doesn't touch Robot ethics, i.e. the risks coming along with robots, at all: Everything about mechanics is happy sunshine and working absurdely perfect. That is another problem with the story that I have: I didn't buy into the steampunk logic at all, as the pure technological background is so far away from believability that I only could consider it as pure fantasy.
The scenery and atmosphere was beautifully described. Characters remain distant, and do some behavioural jumps which I simply didn't understand, e.g. Tacy's love story. The logic of the detective story was somewhat far-fetched and has some holes.
evamaren's review
3.0
This is a steampunk short fiction focusing on a stolen android in 1880 London, featuring Mycroft Holmes as a side character.
Don't read this if you've read a lot of 19th-century novels - you'll only notice all the inauthentic details, for example in social conventions and etiquette. E.g. a baronet who introduces himself as "I am *Sir* Arthur..." (even today, one never uses titles when introducing oneself), and also failing to introduce the ladies accompanying him? A woman introduces herself as "I am Mistress ..."? Not to mention the head-hopping and various problems with POV (sometimes, it's simply a complete mystery who is describing or observing things at the moment: it can't be an omniscient narrator because they are limited and speculating based on appearance, and it cannot be any of the characters either). And the romance that appears out of nowhere!
The world-building also seems to have internal contradictions (e.g. on the one hand, people immediately assume that Miss Gof must be Sir Arthur's (the inventor's) scientific assistant, since she doesn't look like a relative but travels with him (why not a wife?) but on the other hand immediately dismiss women as obvious ignoramuses/naturally disinterested in scientific matters - which is it?). And then we have machines that all fall apart if someone simply whistles at a particular frequency! Sadly this didn't work for me. Perhaps I would have liked it more if I'd known beforehand that it was a continuation of another story - but why publish it separately if it can't stand on its own?
It does have some charming aspects, however, so it still gets an "it was alright" 2.5-star rating, rounded up because I'm guessing it would have been better if I'd read The Ghost of Cwmlech Manor before going into it.
Don't read this if you've read a lot of 19th-century novels - you'll only notice all the inauthentic details, for example in social conventions and etiquette. E.g. a baronet who introduces himself as "I am *Sir* Arthur..." (even today, one never uses titles when introducing oneself), and also failing to introduce the ladies accompanying him? A woman introduces herself as "I am Mistress ..."? Not to mention the head-hopping and various problems with POV (sometimes, it's simply a complete mystery who is describing or observing things at the moment: it can't be an omniscient narrator because they are limited and speculating based on appearance, and it cannot be any of the characters either). And the romance that appears out of nowhere!
The world-building also seems to have internal contradictions (e.g. on the one hand, people immediately assume that Miss Gof must be Sir Arthur's (the inventor's) scientific assistant, since she doesn't look like a relative but travels with him (why not a wife?) but on the other hand immediately dismiss women as obvious ignoramuses/naturally disinterested in scientific matters - which is it?). And then we have machines that all fall apart if someone simply whistles at a particular frequency! Sadly this didn't work for me. Perhaps I would have liked it more if I'd known beforehand that it was a continuation of another story - but why publish it separately if it can't stand on its own?
It does have some charming aspects, however, so it still gets an "it was alright" 2.5-star rating, rounded up because I'm guessing it would have been better if I'd read The Ghost of Cwmlech Manor before going into it.
lnatal's review
3.0
You may read online at Thor.com.
Openin lines:
November 1880
On a foggy autumn morning, a horseless carriage chugged slowly along a fashionable London street. The carriage was of antique design, steam-driven instead of the more modern clockwork, with a tall chimney pipe that added its acrid mite to the smoky air. A burly footman sat on its box, peering through the gloom at the house numbers. As they passed a pleasant Georgian lodging-house, he hastily pulled the brake and the carriage came to a halt with a long hiss of escaping steam.
Openin lines:
November 1880
On a foggy autumn morning, a horseless carriage chugged slowly along a fashionable London street. The carriage was of antique design, steam-driven instead of the more modern clockwork, with a tall chimney pipe that added its acrid mite to the smoky air. A burly footman sat on its box, peering through the gloom at the house numbers. As they passed a pleasant Georgian lodging-house, he hastily pulled the brake and the carriage came to a halt with a long hiss of escaping steam.
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