Who could resist a title like that? Don’t you just have to discover what it’s all about? I did, anyway and found a tightly plotted novel behind the book’s atmospheric cover, full of twists and cliffhangers that led inexorably from one chapter to the next. In short: a real page turner.

Dr Watson, as usual, narrates. He tells the reader how he was called upon, some time before the story proper starts, and rather against his will, to officiate in his medical capacity at the hanging of a man, Simon Rhoads, found guilty of murdering his friend, one Paul Watts. Up to the last moment – and it’s all described in vivid and shocking detail – Rhoads shouts out his innocence, despite all the evidence against him. But then, some eighteen months later, another body is found, killed in very much the same way and identified as….wait for it…. the same Paul Watts, recently returned from America.

What a scandal! The powers that be refuse to admit to the British public that a terrible miscarriage of justice has taken place. After all, Police Commissioners, even the Prime Minister, might have to resign. They cannot permit it to happen, and so Sherlock Holmes is called on to investigate privately.

Poor Dr Watson. He does his best to paint the picture for us, many years after the event when all the main actors have passed away, drawing on his copious notes. But though he describes each person connected to the case in minute detail, as well as the places where they live and work, he just cannot seem to see the wood for the trees. He’s not alone in this: the hapless Inspector Gregson is similarly bemused. So it’s up to Holmes, as ever, to unravel the mystery, and uncover what can only be described as a truly fiendish plot. Great stuff.

Ken Courtenay is a musician and retired IT consultant. Although he has written many stories of the science, horror and mystery variety, this is his first novel.

The book will be published on September 29, 2025, and can be preordered from MX https://mxpublishing.com/collections/new-books/products/the-case-of-the-man-who-died-twice-a-sherlock-holmes-adventure-paperback or from Amazon.co.uk https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=The+Man+who+died+twice+Courtenay or Amazaon.com https://www.amazon.com/Case-Man-Who-Died-Twice/dp/180424676X/