Matthew Bartholomew, unorthodox but effective physician to Michaelhouse college in medieval Cambridge, is as worried as anyone about the pestilence that is ravaging Europe and seems to be approaching England. But he is distracted by the sudden and inexplicable death of the Master of Michaelhouse - a death the University authorities do not want investigated.

These volumes are the complete Martin Hewitt stories, taking Arthur Morrison's original publications and presenting them as Sherlock Holmes adventures. If you are a fan of Holmes, enjoy! And by all means, seek out the original Hewitt stories and enjoy them as well.

This is the fourth story from The Art of Sherlock Holmes project and first appeared in The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories, Part V.

On the eve of Newgate Prison's demolition, Watson spies Holmes leaving a public sale of the prison's miscellany in the company of a beautiful stranger, and in possession of an unusual trophy–the death mask of a woman who, more than 20 years earlier, had been executed for the murder of her three children. Holmes agrees to satisfy Watson's curiosity about the memento by recounting the decades-old history of its subject.

When misadventure led a schoolboy in London to employment at Baker Street, few could have guessed where his introduction to Sherlock Holmes would lead. But as the lad matures and he finds himself caught in the middle of a murder investigation, his friendship with Holmes and Watson lures him into the role of detective. 'Billy' documents his experiences, and soon his sleuthing skills not only bring him to another murder, but also lay the foundation for his metamorphosis into a famous mystery writer.

On concluding a long day of house calls, Dr. Watson receives an urgent summons to attend his friend, Sherlock Holmes. He arrives at 221B Baker Street to find Holmes in a state of deep shock and wearing scorched clothing that reeks of excrement.

Bond is not the only agent out there. An urgent signal is received at the London headquarters of the ultra-secret government department known as Sector Three. Klemperer, their agent-in-place in Tunisia, is sheltering a North Korean diplomat who wishes to defect to the West, bringing with him vital intelligence concerning foreign sleeper agents operating in Britain. The Sector sends out their operative, code-named Robert Lane, who arrives at an hotel specified by Klemperer, to await contact.

In the year 1908, Holmes believed himself to be in retirement. Watson was once again in private practice and unwed. Mrs. Hudson had gone to Sussex to act as Holmes's housekeeper. But the fates had agreed that Martha Hudson and John Watson should be together. Or had they? When Dr. Watson proposes to Martha Hudson, it sets off a series of events that only Sherlock Holmes can deal with. Watson has already had three wives—all have died under unfortunate circumstances. Colm Campbell, Martha Hudson's nephew, thinks there is more here than meets the eye.

Watson spends half his wound pension on the turf and his gambling addiction renders him unable even to pay his half share of the rent of the rooms at Baker Street. But when one of his rare bursts of prosperity enables him to buy two strikingly good pictures from a pawnbroker, Mycroft Holmes takes a remarkable interest. And what is the meaning of the little rhyme that runs round the canvas of the painting.

Victorian England's most famous consulting detective is hot on the trail of London's most notorious serial killer, Jack the Ripper. But in Sherlock Holmes and the Whitechapel Vampire, Jack is a vampire and Holmes' refusal to believe it could be his undoing as the two match wits in this delightfully original first novel.

More tales from the dispatch box of Doctor John Watson. These 10 stories have appeared previously in various volumes of The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories and other anthologies. They come together as a collection for the first time.

Part history, part true-crime, and entirely entertaining, listen to the story of how the behemoth Oxford English Dictionary was made. You'll hang on every word as you discover that the dictionary's greatest contributor was also an insane murderer working from the confines of an asylum.

William Shakespeare, the most celebrated poet in the English language, left behind nearly a million words of text, but his biography has long been a thicket of wild supposition arranged around scant facts. With a steady hand and his trademark wit, Bill Bryson sorts through this colorful muddle to reveal the man himself.

Vain and charismatic Walter Sickert made a name for himself as a painter in Victorian London. But the ghoulish nature of his art - as well as extensive evidence - points to another name, one that's left its bloody mark on the pages of history: Jack the Ripper. Cornwell has collected never-before-seen archival material - including a rare mortuary photo, personal correspondence and a will with a mysterious autopsy clause - and applied cutting-edge forensic science to open an old crime to new scrutiny.

Why did Agatha Christie spend her career pretending that she was "just" an ordinary housewife, when clearly she wasn't? Lucy Worsley's biography is not just of a massively, internationally successful writer. It's also the story of a person who, despite the obstacles of class and gender, became an astonishingly successful working woman. With access to rarely seen personal letters and papers, Lucy Worsley's biography is both authoritative and entertaining and makes us realize what an extraordinary pioneer Agatha Christie was—truly a woman who wrote the twentieth century.