the hound of the baskervilles

A literary friend of Toby's mentioned enjoying Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories years ago and I put it on the infinite 'to be read list' in my head and promptly forgot about it. But since the fall I've become obsessed with watching House. Toby's a bit perplexed by my love of House rightly stating that I would never be happy if I went to a doctor like that, but I tried to reason with him that my love of House is his eccentric id-driven brilliancy. What's not to love?! So I read that House is an homage of sorts to Sherlock Holmes and that moved Holmes back into my consciousness and the top of the book list. I enjoyed this book, it was a quick read and a page turner. The thing is, I feel like contemporary culture and the oversaturation of crime shows on TV sort of take the bite out of this book, a lot of the twists and turns are fairly transparent in this day and age. I mean the bit about the two stolen boots and then the unworn one is replaced is really obvious. The character and catch phrases of Holmes have a certain ubiquity that can make reading the original seem almost quaint. It's awful to say, but at times I was like, isn't that cute, wanting to give precocious Conan Doyle a pat on the head. Maybe I need to read the complete Sherlock Holmes stories to more fully appreciate him, I just didn't find this book terribly complex but it was an enjoyable read. Although I'd love to read a biography on Conan Doyle because I think his life story is fascinating and tragic, especially in light that a man, who's most famous character is known for stressing deductive logic, turned to believing in fairies after losing his son in the war.