The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes: The Complete Short Stories » ((Edited by Leslie S. Klinger))

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was both a doctor and a believer in spirits, which may partly explain why his Sherlock Holmes is one of literature's most beloved detectives: Holmes always approaches his cases with the gentility and logic of a scientist, but the stories are suffused with an aura of the supernatural. Narrated by devoted assistant Dr. John H. Watson, Holmes's adventures were so addictive that fans protested the master deducer's "death" in 1893 and Doyle had to resurrect him.

A cause for international celebration—the most important Sherlock Holmes publication in four decades.

The Washington Post - Daniel Stashower

The result is a beautiful and thoroughly enjoyable edition that somehow manages to synthesize all that has come before, and will appeal to both first-time readers and seasoned veterans. The lavish boxed set presents all the original short stories in the order of their publication (setting aside the eccentric chronology of the earlier annotated edition) and will be followed next year by a third volume devoted to the four longer stories -- including, of course, The Hound of the Baskervilles. An evocative preface by John le Carré is followed by an informative essay from Klinger, offering useful background on Holmes and his world. More than 800 illustrations are scattered throughout the text, many of them culled from the magazines in which the stories first appeared. Periodic sidebars guide the reader through potentially rocky terrain such as the Boer War; the rules of rugby; and baritsu, the obscure Japanese system of self-defense that proved so helpful to Holmes at the Reichenbach Falls.