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The Sign of Four: A Sherlock Holmes Mystery - Community Reviews back

by Arthur Conan Doyle
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realityinabox
realityinabox rated it 12 years ago
MEH! This one failed in all the ways the A Study in Scarlett did as well. I had hope that we'd avoid another journey to Utah in this one, but instead we got a journey to India instead. The first third had me intrigued, the second third was a trudge, and the third third was skimmed very quickly. ...
CharlotteBuriedinBooks
CharlotteBuriedinBooks rated it 12 years ago
So, I certainly didn't expect this book to start like this. With Sherlock doped up on cocaine - because he was bored. Without a puzzle to keep him ticking over he's lost. Thankfully the boredom didn't last long (long enough though for Watson to lecture him on the dangers of such a drug - very for...
AmySea
AmySea rated it 12 years ago
I didn't love this Sherlock Holmes book because I wasn't really engaged by the mystery. That said, though, some of the mystery took place in India, so there was a bit of an exotic flare about it. It's also the book in which we find out how Dr. Watson meets his beloved wife Mary. This book was als...
Philosophical Musings of a Book Nerd
Philosophical Musings of a Book Nerd rated it 12 years ago
This is the second of the Sherlock Holmes novels and opens with Sherlock Holmes shooting up cocaine and Watson sitting in his chair deciding whether he should object or not. In fact, the story opens with Holmes shooting up cocaine and closes with Holmes shooting cocaine which book ends a rather comp...
amartianmonkey
amartianmonkey rated it 12 years ago
The second of Conan Doyle's four longer Sherlock Holmes stories and Holmes is called upon by a young lady who needs the great detective's help with a mystery regarding her missing father and pearls that keep arriving for her.And so the games afoot! well it is when there's a shady one-legged man invo...
What I Happen to Be Reading At the Moment
The illustrations were nice and sometimes quite cute (the badger in the cage sticking its paw out at Watson was a particular favorite) and the smoggy darkness of late 19th century London was well captured. My major issue with this is that it was not narrated by Watson, making some depictions of char...
politerobot
politerobot rated it 12 years ago
Though I am thoroughly enjoying going through the Sherlock Holmes-stories by Arthur Conan Doyle, this one gets only two stars because I could not set aside my views on racism and colonialism while reading it. The parts about India was so horrifying a read that I wanted to skip them. Englishmen outra...
caseyreads
caseyreads rated it 12 years ago
The Sign of the Four didn't interest me as much as the Study in Scarlet, even though the first half captivated me. I thought the lengthy back story at the end was long-winded, and I would have rather have had Holmes and Watson done some deducing and interviewing to figure it all out...rather than a ...
Flying Kick-a-pow!
Flying Kick-a-pow! rated it 13 years ago
Actual rating: 4.5 starsWell, I'm trying to write like a billion reviews today, plus I already talked a lot about why I loved these books in my review of A Study in Scarlet, so ... I'll keep this relatively brief.The second Sherlock Holmes novel deals with a complex plot involving the East India Com...
richardbrockbank1
richardbrockbank1 rated it 13 years ago
A far less engaging mystery than A Study in Scarlet, with a ridiculous love story to boot, this Holmes novel is too dated to be enjoyable today. While there are three or four memorablly quotable short passages during the first ten chapters or so of the book, and the way Bartholomew Sholto discovers ...
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