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From Booklist, Copyright © American Library Association. Used with permission.

When this Holmes pastiche was published in 1941, some mighty names Raymond Chandler, Rex Stout, Christopher Morley were effusive in their praise. Then came limbo, but now a new generation can sample the book for themselves. Sydney Silchester is a young fogy retired early to the countryside. His love of honey brings him to a beekeeper who could be a mass murderer in training. Before Sydney can become a victim, he's adopted by elderly neighbor Mr. Mycroft. Who is he, we wonder? The Master's older brother? Holmes himself, being coy? Either way, this old windbag peculiar specific affinities between the olfactory sense of one particular species isn't what either Sherlock or Mycroft sounded like. Or maybe this Mr. Mycroft is trying, Columbo-like, to use being underrated as a strategy? What works well here is the way Mr. Mycroft echoes Holmes' empiricism, exalting the evidence of the senses and seeing danger in ignoring it. Thus, a glimpse of a white rag is enough to begin the killer's undoing. Holmes' pastiches are a tricky thing, given fans' devotion to the original, but this one, despite some oddities, deserves its republication.--Don Crinklaw Copyright 2019 Booklist

Publishers Weekly
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A love of honey leads Sydney Silchester, the curmudgeonly narrator of this solid entry from Heard (1889-1971) in the American Mystery Classics series, to the door of the Heregroves, the only beekeepers in the environs of the English village of Ashton Clearwater. When, some months later, Mrs. Heregrove is stung to death by a swarm of her own bees, Silchester is distressed: how will he satisfy his sweet tooth? Out for a walk, he notices a neatly written sign posted on a gate advertising surplus honey. Up the garden path he goes and meets Mr. Mycroft, whom he subsequently describes as "a very remarkable man... a little vain and fanciful and rather exhausting to be with." Mycroft embraces him as a Watson-like companion in adventure, and the game is afoot as they investigate the bee-stinging death. At the time of its first publication in 1941, this novel was met with great rejoicing among Sherlock Holmes fans, though contemporary readers may struggle to care about Silchester and his schemes. That said, there is fun to be had in reading Silchester's self-absorbed narration. (Mar.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.