The Affair of the Mysterious Letter (2019)
Written by: Alexis Hall
Genre: Fantasy
Pages: 350 (Kindle)
Publisher: Ace
Why I chose it: I’m a big fan of Hall’s Prosperity series.
I like the way Hall can write characters full of outlandish and oversized personalities, and create a weird world for his characters to run amok in. I’ve been waiting eagerly for him to return to fantasy novels, so when this was announced, I hit the pre-order button.
The Premise:
In this charming, witty, and weird fantasy novel, Alexis Hall pays homage to Sherlock Holmes with a new twist on those renowned characters.
Upon returning to the city of Khelathra-Ven after five years fighting a war in another universe, Captain John Wyndham finds himself looking for somewhere to live, and expediency forces him to take lodgings at 221b Martyrs Walk. His new housemate is Ms. Shaharazad Haas, a consulting sorceress of mercurial temperament and dark reputation.
When Ms. Haas is enlisted to solve a case of blackmail against one of her former lovers, Miss Eirene Viola, Captain Wyndham is drawn into a mystery that leads him from the salons of the literary set to the drowned back-alleys of Ven and even to a prison cell in lost Carcosa. Along the way he is beset by criminals, menaced by pirates, molested by vampires, almost devoured by mad gods, and called upon to punch a shark.
But the further the companions go in pursuit of the elusive blackmailer, the more impossible the case appears. Then again, in Khelathra-Ven reality is flexible, and the impossible is Ms. Haas’ stock-in-trade.
Very minor spoilers below.
Discussion: Any book review that involves Sherlockiana has to begin with a quick rundown of what (to me) successfully constitutes a “Sherlock and Watson” story. Stripped down to its bones, I want:
- A sense of connection between Watson and Holmes. A sense that in their companionship, they’ve found something each of them needed. I want that spark of delight in each other’s company, be it platonic or romantic.
- A Holmes who is clever and fascinating, not as purely rational as they would like everyone to believe. A creature of impulse, but with a core of kindness and decency.
- A Watson who is a strong right hand, physically and emotionally. A person who’s come through trauma without losing their sense of self. A calm and seemingly sensible sort of person, who, nonetheless, craves adventure and the recherché.
- I love the Holmes canon. I adore the barely restrained insanity that Doyle lays out as rational mysteries. So I want mysteries that are out of the ordinary.
For a longer breakdown about what makes a Sherlock and Watson story successful for me, you can look at my review of A Study in Honor.
So let’s look at Hall’s version, Shaharazad Haas and John Wyndham. Do they make my arbitrary grade?
Shaharazad Haas ticks a couple of those boxes — clever (though we don’t actually see her cleverness so much as her audacious cunning), able to store prodigious amounts of information in her head (sure, she can cast complex spells easily, and she is entirely au courant with all the movers and shakers in her society, from the upper crust to the lower class) — but she’s also more venal and self-centered than Holmes generally is. She’s genuinely dismissive of her blackmailed client (unlike the canon Holmes who finds blackmail a killing offense), and casually cruel.
But overall, she works. Why?
Because of Wyndham. Wyndham is the ideal Watson. As in the canon, Haas challenges Wyndham to speak his mind and rise above conventional thinking. Like a good Watson, Wyndham steadies Haas, and through his stories, humanizes the Great Detective.
Wyndham is a man raised in a straight-laced religious society who broke free, went to school in the Big Bad City, then went to fight an endless war in an alien dimension. He returns, damaged, but still optimistic. He’s a simple character but with depth. He fled his home and its religion but he also keeps to its principles — humility, loyalty, and diligence — even while choosing a different path. I loved the way Hall wrote him as a man hovering on the edge of two worlds.
…my Eyan origins rendered my company unpalatable to a number of the city’s residents. Having been raised with a rigid sense of propriety, I fear I may have given some of my prospective co-tenants the impression that I begrudged them the freedoms that I, in truth, envied (p. 7).
This is a man primed to be a companion to a wild sorceress with no particular respect for social niceties. Wyndham is dying for a good adventure.
So with that out of the way, let me talk about the book itself.
This is not a straight retelling of a Sherlock story with a fantasy twist. No, this is a book where Hall has gleefully mashed up several genres and author inspirations until the book becomes like a snake devouring its own tail. This is Sherlockiana by way of Lovecraft, by way of Robert Chambers’ King in Yellow, with a big ol’ glug of Douglas Adams’ Dirk Gently, which is itself Sherlock-inspired. It’s a twist of inspirations playing extremely well with each other.
Hall uses the structure of Conan Doyle’s stories — Wyndham relating his tale and his relationship with Haas to the reader from some point in the future. Hall gives us the magical meeting where Haas makes the fateful series of deductions regarding Wyndham, and Hall recreates it without the scene feeling stale. It falls into that happy example of “something the same, but different!” The story is familiar enough to get easily absorbed into; different enough to feel fresh and exciting.
I really enjoyed the worldbuilding. In mash-up stories, the danger is that the whole can feel derivative, but Hall really thought about his borrowed elements and made them work toward a cohesive whole.
I liked that Wyndham is a trans man, no questions asked or explanations given, who marries a man (as evidenced by Wyndham’s acknowledgements at the beginning where he dedicates this story to his husband). I love that Shaharazad Haas is pansexual, and is constantly running into bad-tempered exes. I loved that all the characters are complicated people, not stock archetypes.
I loved the dialogue, which is crisp and witty yet always weirdly honest.
I certainly did not kill him. Eirene and I simply contrived a situation in which Master Roux, of his own free will, exposed himself to extradimensional forces that tragically consumed him. Had he been less venal, he would be with us today. Not in this room, of course. Ghastly man (p. 27).
I personally try to stay out of politics. It’s usually boring or fatal, and rarely anything in between (p. 41)
I could quote more than a dozen small snippets that amused me immensely. This is definitely a quotable book!
The plot worked well in its own gonzo way. Haas is hired to find out who’s blackmailing a previous lover of hers, threatening her imminent marriage to a fish merchant. It’s not quite a Sherlock Holmes-style plot, more adventure than mystery; more action scenes than deductions. Mostly, Haas gets a checklist of everyone who might want to ruin Eirene Viola’s future, and she and Wyndham go poke at the suspects until they’re crossed off the list. This works because it’s a really good way to showcase Haas’s personality and introduce Wyndham (and the reader) to the complicated societies of this city.
The ending was fun because even though the identity of the blackmailer is telegraphed, the reveal and solution are inventive and weirdly touching.
However, there were small things that annoyed me.
Because Wyndham is writing this story for an audience, we are often treated to “my editor says…” asides. Some of them work, but some just slow the story down.
There is an awful lot of telling in the first chapters, and while some of it really seems to be the best way to get essential information across, it occasionally drags.
There are writing quirks that are amusing the first time and less so as time goes on: Wyndham’s refusal to print any foul language or immodest stories on the page, for example.
There was no postmark so I assume it was hand delivered but messengers are only a little more expensive than…” And here, I am sorry to say, Ms. Haas made a most inappropriate comparison that I would prefer not to repeat (p. 29).
Here, Ms. Haas gave me a detailed and unflattering summary of Mr. du Maurier’s character in terms sufficiently colourful that I would not even attempt to put them before my readers (p. 32).
“I cannot believe I engaged in connubial activities with this gentleman. But I suppose I was very young.” As a matter of record, I should add that the words “engaged,” “connubial,” “activities,” and “gentleman” were not, in actuality used by Ms. Haas at this juncture, but I have taken some licence in representing her use of language in order to protect the sensibilities of my readers (p. 43).
There is one segment that didn’t work for me as well — their side jaunt into Carcosa is more mad nightmare than plot, though I feel like it needs a careful rereading. But Carcosa and madness seem inextricably linked, so maybe this section was always destined to be written this way.
The bigger irritant is that this is a book that feels designed to mimic a magazine serial. Because they’re winnowing down their suspects, and each suspect is a member of a certain segment of society, there’s a definite sense of stages to travel through. A number of adventures they must overcome. A certain number of cliff-hangers that Wyndham acknowledges he must use. On the one hand, this definitely adds a believable flavor to Wyndham’s accounts and helps the world and audience feel like a presence. I felt like I was reading the serial along with other people. On the other, it also means that if you’re reading this in one binge session, there’s some odd choppiness. If I were a more patient person, I might have tried reading only one chapter a day.
In Conclusion: This book gets my hearty recommendation for people who like fantasy Sherlockiana, for people who enjoy wordsmithery, and for those who like quirky characters and wild adventures. I think anyone who enjoyed Theodora Goss’s Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club series will eat this one right up. Me, I’m hoping for a sequel or three, and soon!
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