BOOK REVIEW

Holmes on the Range by Steve Hockensmith. Edgar Award nominee

(Brought to you by kat impatientreader.com)  Our first-person narrator Big Red stands over a dead body on the prairie.  It is Perkins, the general manager of the ranch.  Big Red has to bury Perkins who has been trampled into bits by stampeding cattle. Life is hard in Montana in 1893, especially if you're a 20 year-old cowboy so desperate for a job that you've hired on at the sinister Bar VR ranch.

Of course the fault lies with Big Red's brother Old Red (who is only 27).  Old Red volunteered them for burial duty because he's itching to study the corpse. The only thing Old Red enjoys more than bossing Big Red is hearing about Sherlock Holmes.  Now Old Red wants his chance to test his own deduction skills.

Big Red finds this exasperating because they have enough to worry about. On the first day of work, all the new hires had to surrender their guns.  They were forbidden to ask questions or wander around.  The McPhersons, thuggish overseers, closed the ranch to outsiders. Now Perkins is dead, and this won't sit well with the owners of the ranch who reside in England.

Worst of all, gossip has an escaped murderer roaming the area! His name is Hungry Bob.

Old Red couldn't care less.  He pursues his investigation into Perkins's death, keeping it secret from the McPhersons.  This isn't easy because someone among the new guys is an informer. The McPhersons get so out-of-control that they attack one of the cowboys with a branding iron.  Then the ranch owners unexpectedly show up from England!

They are an even stranger group: a pompous old duke with a gambling problem, his level-headed daughter Lady Clara, a foolish young earl, a rich investor named Edwards, and a mischievous maid Emily.  Their arrival results in another dead body! So Old Red plays on their love of gambling, and manipulates the duke and the earl into betting on whether or not he can solve the murders.

Now the brothers can do their detecting under the tenuous protection of the earl.  But the McPhersons are crowding close, eager for a chance to shoot them. At the same time, the ranch owners have their own agendas. Now a simple murder case encompasses scandal, fraud, and death!

I first approached this book with real trepidation:  Sherlock Holmes, ick. Comic westerns, double-ick.  But it turned out to be a great read: full of action, and laugh-out-loud humor.

The brothers are fleshed out enough not to seem like cardboard types.  Big Red is confident and high-spirited. Old Red is cautious, introverted, and dour.  Old Red is the boss, but also deeply ashamed about his lack of education. Because he's illiterate, his younger brother has to read him the Holmes stories.  Old Red's sacrifices paid for Big Red's education. Their constant bickering is both realistic and funny. 

The universe of Holmes on The Range is somewhat larger-than-life: here, Sherlock Holmes is a real person. Everyone speaks in flamboyantly colorful dialect.  But the action is fast-paced and gritty, well-grounded in realistic details. The McPhersons give off a real sense of threat.  You never mistake this delightful adventure as a mere joke. Buy Holmes on the Range on Amazon through this link: 

Holmes on the Range

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