Watson and Holmes. A Study in Black. Karl Bollers (Writer), Rick Leonardi, Larry Stroman (Art), Paul Mendoza & GuruEFX, Archie Van Buren, Jay David Ramos (Colours), Taylor Esposito, Dave Lanphear, Nicole McDonnell, Wilson Ramos Jr. (Letters) New Paradigm Studios (2013)

A hugely enjoyable and engaging alternative Sherlock Holmes story that confidently moves the cast to different time and context. John Watson is a medical intern in the Convent Emergency Center , Harlem , New York  where he meets Sherlock Holmes who arrives inquiring about a patient who has just been brought in. Holmes makes a suggestion regarding the patient that Watson follows up and this pushes him to visit Holmes at  Hudson's Bookshop, 221b Baker Street Harlem. The case and Watsons's involvement develops very nicely as an extensive and very dangerous conspiracy becomes clear and arrives at a very satisfactory conclusion.
The cast are superb. The headline is that both Watson and Holmes are New York African Americans and the story has a powerful New York context.  What matters is the joyous confidence with which Karl Bollers has written Watson and Holmes, the way that they interact with each other, respond to changing circumstances and in particular the way that John Watson is developed and presented is a huge pleasure. They are utterly true to themselves and their context, the essential details of a Sherlock Holmes story are presented with tremendous understated skill, none are blatantly highlighted and shoved at the reader, they are stitched firmly into the story. Best of all is the key relationship between Watson and Holmes, it is natural and unforced, the motivations for both that underlie their friendship is neatly set up.
The art by Rick Leonardi in the main story is a pleasure to read, it is full of details that firmly anchor the cast in a physical location, the cast are expressive, the body language is eloquent. The cast, including the walk on parts, are all individual, there are no generic characters. They all demand the readers attention without crowding out the action. The quiet moments are as interesting as the action, the cast are interested in what they are saying and that brings the reader into the moment.
In the Epilogue, Larry Stroman's art is distinctively different and equally effective, he captures the tension that runs through a sharp and bitter story that packs a considerable punch in a short space.
The colouring captures the emotional tones of the story and highlights the relevant details with subtle care and craft. This is a noir version of Holmes, the story is dark and even in the light of day there are deep shadows. The colouring shifts tones that track the tone of the story without shouting it, they frame the action and engage the reader.
This is a superb Holmes story, confidently taking the ideas and using them in a engaging and enjoyable way, a pleasure.

The Beast with Five Fingers. W.F. Harvey. Wordsworth Editions (2009)

A great collection of stories, some supernatural, some crime and others from a unjustly neglected English writer. The mix of stories is very nicely judged by the editor David Stuart Davies, they show the breath of W.F. Harvey's writing. From the supernatural stories in the collection, the title story is a very enjoyable and straightforward story of a supernatural menace. The tension is nicely created and swiftly built upon, the climax sharp and to the point. A much more oblique story, "August Heat" uses a technique that W.F. Harvey liked, the conclusion is left strongly implied rather than delivered. The reader is not cheated, the climax is the least aspect of the story, the careful set up is the reason and it is done with such care and skill that it can carry off an open conclusion.
"The Man Who Hated Aspidistras" is more of a sliver than a story, it is not even an anecdote, still it slyly satisfying as a slightly bitter joke. on the other hand "The Fern" is savagely bitter, beautifully paced and the biting open conclusion offers no refuge for the cast or the reader. To show off his astonishing variety "The Angel of Stone" manages in three pages to remind the cast and reader that time is precious and small pleasures are among its greatest joys.
One of the stand out stories in the book is "A Middle-Class Tragedy", with a cruel economy and precision it skewers its leading character. The writing is beautiful, not a word is out of place, the conclusion is heartbreaking in its entirely justified smallness. A section in the book is titled "Twelve Strange Cases", these are stories narrated by a middle-aged nurse and are about some of the cases she has attended at. The greatest pleasure in these stories, each of which has a clever plot, fully realised and with very well judged reveals, is the narrator herself. Her personality sparkles off the page, she draws the reader in with the pleasure in the storytelling. She is given enough space to emerge as a serious, competent, curious and forceful personality. This is critical as the stories work because she is such a strong character, the plots draw their force because of her strength. The stories moreover are peppered with her salty observations on her patients, fellow nurses and hospitals, she has a cheerfully biting turn of phrase.
All in all this is a really enjoyable collection of stories, a pleasure to read.

Killing the Messenger. Thomas Peele. Crown Publishers (2012)

This is a heartfelt, superbly structured and beautifully written book about why a journalist was murdered on the 2 August 2007 in Oakland, California. The story is a wide ranging history of a radical religion, fraud, the hideous results of racism, greed, incompetence and the bottomless well of human malice, desire for power and dominance.
Thomas Peele places the killing of Chauncey Bailey in its context of the dreadful history of violent racism that runs through American history. Chauncey Bailey was killed because he was a journalist and he was killed to prevent a story being published. The fact that he was an African-American and was killed by a member of the Black Muslim sect in Oakland is just one of the sad and horrible facets to this case that Thomas Peele  illuminates.
There are four broad threads to the narrative, the first is the response to the attack on the freedom of the press that the murder of Chauncey Bailey represents and that Thomas Peele as a fellow journalist wants to forcefully respond to. The next broad thread is the ugly and murderous history of racist  repression and oppression that was rampant in American society throughout the last century. The third broad thread is the miserable history of Oakland, referred to memorably as the "shitbox of the west". Finally there is the extraordinary and heartbreaking story of the Nation of Islam, a cold-hearted fraud that violently traded on the rage and deep despair of African-Americans to benefit a small number of staggeringly corrupt men. In a carefully researched, artfully structured book, Thomas Peele shows how each of the these threads slowly wound across each other and finally lead to the murder of Chauncey Bailey.
The vicious depths of the fraud carried out by the Nation of Islam and its breakaway sect in Oakland are laid bare in all their sordid and mean details. The exploitation of the rage, sorrow and dislocation of fellow African-Americans is a sad and moving story. The actions of the chief fraudsters themselves are eye watering in their depravity, malice and destructiveness. In particular Yusuf Bey, the patriarch of  the Black Muslim sect in Oakland and founder of Your Black Muslim Bakery, which was the linchpin of his criminal enterprise was an appalling man. A serial child abuser on a very significant scale he ruined the lives of an uncountable number of people in the pursuit of power, vanity and money.
Yusuf Bey flourished in Oakland due to spectacular incompetence, indifference and civic apathy that has dogged Oakland throughout its history. All of these factors played direct contributing parts in the murder of Chauncey Bailey.
Thomas Peele tells a very specific and particular story, rooted firmly in a location that quietly and effectively casts a revealing light across a dark slice of  current history. This is a griping book, easy to read and chilling in its revelations. Journalism may be the first draft of history, this is is simply superbly written history.