I received a free electronic copy of this work from Netgalley, Mattias Bostrom, and Grove Atlantic - Mysterious Press in exchange for an honest review. Thank you all for sharing your hard work with me.

This history of the evolution of Sherlock Holmes and John Watson from conception in the late nineteenth century through the films and television serials of the twenty-first is extraordinary. At times it seemed extremely long, but I can't imagine anything that could be cut without harming the whole. And it is whole. All of the parties tasked with continuing the stories of Holmes and Watson, with interpreting the original stories into new mediums, with holding the essence of Doyle's vision, have worked these many decades to maintain the course true. Holmes and Watson were the first fictional characters to outpace their author in name recognition and general acceptance. They are still recognized around the world and continue to be mistaken for persons living and breathing. Fans young and old still find their stories in whatever medium available to be challenging and deeply interesting.

Thanks Grove Atlantic and netgalley for this ARC.

All the info you ever or never thought to learn about Holmes genre. Its amazing, thrilling, and all inclusive

This book is interesting but not what I thought I was getting. I was mistakenly thinking this was start from Young Holmes to the great Detective.
however I thought it was a good book.

Sherlock Holmes has been a cultural icon on both sides of the Atlantic since his first appearance in Study in Scarlet in the 1887 Beeton’s Christmas Annual. The famous consulting detective has occupied nearly every aspect of popular culture; from magazines, to books, to comic strips, to Broadway musicals, to movies and television shows. Sherlock Holmes has fought criminal masterminds, spectral hounds, nazis, Jack the Ripper, eldritch horrors, and vampires. His name and his legend have taken on quite a life of their own, and Holmes seems to exist almost entirely separate from the man who created him.

In From Holmes to Sherlock, Boström takes us from young Arthur Conan Doyle taking studious notes in lecture with Dr. Joseph Bell at the University of Edinburgh, through to the modern hit BBC television series Sherlock, starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman. The century and a half span encompasses two world wars, the Great Depression, the advent of radio, the golden age of Hollywood, and the ubiquity of television. We see Conan Doyle trying desperately to rein in a creation that broke free from his control even in the earliest days. We see his heirs try desperately to retain some aspect of their father’s greatest work. We see how the world has made Sherlock Holmes their own, through countless books, movies, plays, and dedicated societies.

This is a must-read for any fans of Sherlock Holmes. Boström has written a comprehensive and fascinating history of one of the most popular fictional characters of all time. The book is rich in detail and engagingly told, and should not be missed by anyone who wants more information about the world’s greatest consulting detective.

An advance copy of this book was provided by the publisher via Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.

Sherlock Holmes is one of the most well-known literary figures of modern literature. He is one of those characters that needs no explanation, and whose shadow and legacy goes before him instead of behind.

I am a big fan of the BBC Sherlock series, as well as the original books themselves, so I was excited to read this exploration of Holmes, Conan Doyle and Sherlockmania in general. The book starts with a biography of Conan Doyle himself, then moves into an account of the continuing publication and movie/TV history of Sherlock and Watson. The research that must have gone into this book is absolutely phenomenal, and the tone is very atmospheric. Bostrom does a great job of handling this book as nonfiction, but still places segments of fictional narrative for ambience.

All in all, I really enjoyed this book and it was an informative read! Thank you to the publisher and to NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my fair and honest review.

Upon finishing this, all I can say is "wow."

That being said, I did have a bit of a difficult time reading it, not because it was an ARC, but because it was so badly formatted as an Kindle e-book that the truncated paragraphs and wrap-around short texts ruined the rhythm of the author's words, and because it covers such a varied cast of characters. If you think this is your run-of-the-mill "how Sir Arthur Conan Doyle created Sherlock Holmes" yarn, you'll be in for a surprise: while the beginning of the book does follow that formula, the rest of the story follows how Holmes became a literary phenomenon even after Doyle's death, and the people who kept him alive: a boy named Kit who devours all the stories and grows up to be Christopher Morley; Doyle's sons Adrian and Denis, who hope to make a living off Holmes while keeping their father's memory alive (neither of them come off particularly well in this book—Adrian is money grubbing and Denis an alcoholic and spendthrift, with a Russian wife who's just as bad); the Baker Street Irregulars and their anti-female attitude, Holmesian actors like the infamous William Gillette, Basil Rathbone, Peter Cushing, Arthur Wontner, even the 1980s Russian Holmes; women like Edith Meiser, writer for the classic American Holmes radio series, just one of Holmes' female fans who fought to break into the "old boys club" that originally was Holmes fandom; and even Eve Titus, who wrote the "Basil of Baker Street" pastiches for children, and finally ending with Robert Downey Jr, Jeremy Brett, all the way down to Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat plotting out a modern-day Sherlock Holmes adaptation on a train.

There are lots of interesting tidbits tossed your way in this book, but you must be a Holmes fan to completely appreciate it. Boström has done an enormous amount of research and it shows, but the writing (or perhaps the translation) is at times almost too cut-and-dried. Rewards abound if you stick with it.

Sherlock Holmes is the most popular fictional character of all time.

What is the book about?
“From Holmes to Sherlock” is written by Mattias Bostrom, a Holmesian (or a Sherlockian) and is translated by Michael Gallagher.

“From Holmes to Sherlock” is a book that reveals the story behind the character ‘Sherlock Holmes’ – the inspiration, the creation and the evolution over the last 130 years or so. We get to hear the stories of the people involved, their lives and death, motivations, feuds and collaboration.

What does it cover?
“From Holmes to Sherlock” starts with the life of Arthur Conan Doyle and his career. We then get to see what happens when Sherlock Holmes becomes a hit across the world. We get to explore the inspiration behind Holmes. The radio shows, silent movies and television series are next. Jeremy Brett’s Sherlock Holmes is covered. Finally, the Hollywood blockbusters like “Young Sherlock Holmes”, “Sherlock Holmes” starring Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law are explored. We end with the TV series “Sherlock” and “Elementary”

The life of Conan Doyle and his progeny and their involvement with the estate is explored in detail. Copyright battles, the need to keep Sherlock Holmes authentic while eking out every penny, the fights between the heirs of the estate is revealed. Next, we get to see the evolution of the Holmes pastiches, parodies and reproductions across the world. The clubs and societies that have sprung up and their workings and influences.

The lives of the people involved in all the above activities (no matter how small) form the basis of this book.

How is it written?
The book is broken down into 8 parts – each dealing with a time. There are about 107 chapters totally. Every chapter looks at various happenings in that period.

What did I like?
The sheer amount of research and detail in this book is mind boggling. I was constantly finding new things to know and aha moments were a dime a dozen. For example – did you know that Leslie Charteris (author of The Saint) was originally a writer on the 1939 radio series.

Next, we come to the pacing. Considering the amount of material, “From Holmes to Sherlock” is written in a fast-paced fashion which makes reading this book less onerous. Instead of being textbook like, it is like a thriller. The book is engaging and is difficult to put down for the most part.

What did I not like?
My biggest gripe with “From Holmes to Sherlock” is its tendency to jump from topic to topic in an almost unstructured fashion. I found it difficult to keep track of what was happening and who was doing what. In general, I would have liked to have more structure in this book.

I would have like the book to focus more on the time starting from Jeremy Brett’s TV series to today. Most people’s fondest recollections have been shaped around this era or around the original stories. While the original stories get a good amount of attention, the former does not get enough. This is important since we would like to know more about “Sherlock” than we would around Basil Rathbone’s movies or Adrian Conan Doyle’s travails.

My Recommendation
I highly recommend “From Holmes to Sherlock” despite its flaws. I think this is a brilliant book that will give a lot of pleasure and insight to any one remotely interested in Sherlock Holmes. It is expected to be published in August 2017.

A fascinating account of the history of Sherlock Holmes. The book starts as a biography of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and transitions into an account of the enduring publication and film history of Sherlock Holmes, while also touching on the impact of the character from a cultural standpoint. The book is written in a very easy to read manner, and the author unfolds the narrative in such a way that the reader will not want to put it down. As a Sherlock Holmes fan, I found this book to be an absolute delight.

Mattias Boström has written a comprehensive book tracing the Sherlock Holmes phenomenon. This book is part biography, part history, and part love letter to the consulting detective - and his legion of fans.
The research in this book is meticulous. The tone is engaging. I love that Mr. Boström treated the various eras of Sherlock with equal seriousness. I have a lot of respect for the various collectors, aficionados, and scholars who have kept Sherlock Holmes alive and in the public eye; none of whom I knew about before reading this book.
This book is a valuable resource for both the casual and serious Sherlockian.

For me, this book could be divided into three parts:

Part 1, a biography of Arthur Conan Doyle focused mostly on his creation of Sherlock Holmes, was an interesting, if a bit sparse read. I was expecting more on his inspiration for each of the stories, but it could just be that the information isn't available (as the book goes into later, Doyle's collection of papers was only made available for researchers very recently). It dispels some myths, such as that Joseph Bell was the inspiration for the character when in reality Doyle witnessed Bell's methods and mannerisms and extrapolated them into a wholly-original detective character, and overall this section was enjoyable.

Part 2, the middle third of the book, focuses a lot on Doyle's children and their various attempts to capitalize on the character in order to fund their eccentric or extravagant lifestyles. This section seriously dragged, especially since I don't have as much personal experience with the Basil Rathbone movies, and I remember finding the John Gielgud radio drama that I listened to as a kid pretty dry and dull. This section also gets into the origins of the various Sherlockian societies, which got a lot of mostly-unimportant exposition (most likely because there is a lot of information about the Sherlockian societies, since most of their main work has been publishing scholarly articles and books).

Part 3 was the most interesting to me, because it focused on the Holmes adaptations that I was most familiar with: the Jeremy Brett adaptations, Disney animated film The Great Mouse Detective (my childhood introduction to Sherlock Holmes, even if I didn't know it at the time), the Robert Downey Jr. movies, and the modern day Sherlock and Elementary series.

So your mileage with this book may vary. It didn't go as in-depth into areas I would've like it to (the writing of the stories), and went way into depth on areas I didn't care as much about (Adrian Conan Doyle's legal wranglings with authors and Hollywood), most likely due to the availability of primary sources.

Excellent - knowledge combined with communication.

This is a book written by an expert for everyone. It's full of information to satisfy the scholar but is written in an engaging style which makes it accessible to the Sherlock Holmes novice.

The book covers the history of the composition of the canon, the copyright squabbles that followed, and the development of Holmes after Conan Doyle - and even during his lifetime. The development of the Sherlockian societies is fascinating and the history of 'playing the game'.

If you only know Holmes from Sherlock or Elementary, this book will hopefully help you to go further into the Holmesian world. You'll be led to the originals and Rathbone and Brett and... That's what I want from a book about Holmes - to be inspired to want to keep exploring.

Bostrom presents an incredibly well-research account of the creation and history of the immortal Sherlock Holmes. The storytelling element makes this an entertaining as well as informative read. This is a must for any Holmes enthusiast.

Highly enjoyable read full of interesting facts. Probably a little more than I bargained for when I started, but it didn't drag.

I have been a Sherlock fan since I was a small child. I like reading other authors books on the Sherlock character and this was no exception. I think Sherlockians will be thrilled with it.

First of all I have only just started reading the book and it's already very interesting. The author begins his book by presenting his readers with a snapshot of a dinner thrown by a Sherlockian society, during which Mark Gattis outlines his plans for the reboot of the Sherlock Holmes adventures, the new show of course will simply be called Sherlock. The author beautifully sets the scene in this dinner, outlining the vision that Gatiss had for Holmes, as the author eloquently puts it, he wants to take it from Holmes to Sherlock. The man Doyle described in his novels and short stories will be brought to modern day London and anyone who has seen the tv series knows that it is a magnificent tv program.
The author then moved us from that dinner to a discussion of Doyle creating Holmes, he transports us back to 1878.
In the chapter on 1878-1879 the author brilliantly imagines and describes a scene that would have taken place between Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (the man who would go on to create Sherlock Holmes) and Dr Joseph Bell (widely believed to be a basis for Holmes).
I have only just statted reading this book and it has captured my imagination. As an avid fan of any Sherlock Holmes talk I was intrigued to read this title and so far it is of to a very promising start.

From the time Sherlock Holmes was created, the world has been fascinated. Over one hundred later, the public still can't get enough of the great detective.

This book starts from the moment Arthur Conan Doyle conceived the idea of a story about an unusual and observant detective, and then follows those who had an influence in bringing Sherlock Holmes through the ages.

At times, it seems like the telling drags a little with too much information about the lives of those who had a hand in crafting and promoting Sherlock Holmes, but those details really bring to life what an impact the detective had on so many people.

I would recommend this to anyone who loves Sherlock Holmes.