71. Graphic Classics : Arthur Conan Doyle

Graphic Classics: Arthur Conan Doyle edited by Tom Pomplun
Graphic Classics, Vol. 2

Pages: 144
Ages: 13+
Finished: Apr. 2, 2009
First Published: 2005
Genre: graphic novel, short stories, classics
Rating: 4/5

Reason for Reading: Next in the series.

First sentence:

The cheese-mites asked how the cheese got there, and warmly debated the matter; the orthodox said - that it came from the air, and the heretics said - from the platter.

Comments: Here in this one large collection are adaptations of two Sherlock Holmes stories plus six more adventurous or ghastly stories and a parable. Each story is written/illustrated by a different person with a wide variety of styles shown from the serious to the cartoonish and even the quite strangely weird. A fabulous collection really, that couldn't better showcase the scope of Doyle's works.

I am quite familiar with Doyle, having read the entire Holmes canon, but from there my experience is lacking. I've read The White Company, an historical fiction novel, and can remember two short ghost stories, though I probably ran into a couple more in high school anthologies, I'm sure. Rick Geary's take on Holmes was pure brilliance. With his experience on his own Victorian series, he knows how to write and draw this type of material. If you ever read this Mr. Geary, why don't you think about doing a series of Holmes books sometime in the future. I for one will be standing in line! Rod Lott and Simon Gane also presented a very good adaptation of Holmes, though. My favourites aside from Geary's treatment of Holmes were Captain Sharkey, a pirate story, The Los Amigos Fiasco, a macabre yet humorous story and The Great Brown-Pericord Motor, the story of a man whose own greed turns himself insane. I certainly have an itching to get my hands on a volume of Doyle's short stories sans Holmes.