From his Arthur Conan Doyle origins to book eighteen in Laurie R. King's Mary Russell mysteries, Sherlock Holmes has developed from a solo misanthrope to a man with an established, albeit complicated, family. His wife, Mary Russell, and Holmes and Irene Adler's son Damien have changed the self-absorbed Holmes in profound ways. Purists might complain, but I revel in the way that King has developed her Holmes character.

In "The Lantern's Dance", Damien and his family are threatened by an unknown Indian connection. As Holmes and Russell track back the clues, a fascinating vein of Holmes' back story is revealed.

Eighteen books is a daunting series to start, but I highly recommend beginning at the beginning and enjoying the ride!

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Thirty years have passed since the publication of Laurie R. King’s first Mary Russell-Sherlock Holmes book, The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, in which teenage Mary first encounters the retired Sherlock Holmes keeping bees in 1915 Sussex. Seventeen Mary Russell books later, in King’s latest titled The Lantern’s Dance, readers find Russell and Holmes stopping by France on their way home from their 1925 Transylvania adventure portrayed in Castle Shade. Planning to stop off to see Holmes’ illegitimate son Damien, now thirty and an artist with a young daughter from his first marriage and a new Scottish physician fiancée, Russell comes face-to-face with a gun as the gun-holding stranger demands her identity.

The house is empty. Following a home invasion by a man possibly from India, he, his daughter, and fiancée have fled. A new adventure is afoot, and Mary’s sprained ankle keeps her at the house while Holmes leaves to find Damien and the others. Meanwhile, Mary explores a trunk, tea chests, and a box containing artifacts from Damien’s (and Holmes'} family history. With no contact between Russell and Holmes for several days, they independently begin to investigate the mystery of the lone intruder and two other Indian-appearing strangers.

With a mystery at its center, The Lantern’s Dance may justly be called as much family history as mystery. At least that is what caught and held my interest. This is my fifth Mary Russell book, and probably my favorite thus far. It is also the first in which I have encountered Holmes’ illegitimate—and largely estranged--son, Damien Adler.

After reading King’s informative "Author’s Note" that follows the novel, I learned that Damien appears in two other Mary Russell books, The Language of Bees and The God of the Hive. As I backtrack to read the books I have missed, those will be my first two. Don’t skip the "Note" when reading The Lantern’s Dance. It will enhance your reading in many ways.

Thanks to NetGalley and Ballantine/Random House for an advance reader copy of this new addition to Laurie R. King’s delightful series.

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I really enjoyed this book. It's always fun to see what Russell and Holmes are getting up to now, although as far as the mystery itself goes, this one was a little staid. The plot seemed exciting at first, and then became more passive through most of the middle, our intrepid detectives each tackling a different issue, neither of which were entirely time sensitive especially since one had literally already waited decades to be discovered. Things seemed to pick up again further in, things got exciting, and then once again they slowed down.

I didn't feel a sense of danger around our main characters in this book, and instead all of the interesting thing were happening in extended flashbacks. I don't mind this, because Laurie R. King knows how weave a mystery and I loved getting to know these new characters, and it just happened to be that the really interesting mystery was wound through the past instead of the present.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, it had a fun mystery, it provided us with more history surrounding our delightful detective duo, and it felt very much like a Mary Russell novel, which I enjoy thoroughly. It just wasn't very exciting. Especially after the last several novels where it seemed like Russell and Holmes were constantly on the go, one-upping bad guys, discovering clues, and going under cover, etc etc, this novel felt more passive. A small vacation, a restful mystery. Goodness knows Russell and Holmes could do with a little less danger in their day-to-day lives. As a treat.

Mary and Holmes arrive at the home of Holmes's son, Damian only to greeted at the front door by by a gun wielding man. Instead of a family reunion the couple discover that Damian and family have fled town following a break in by an Indian man. The housekeeper tells Holmes that two other Indian men appeared at the door after Damian had fled. Holmes immediately takes off for Paris to look for the missing family. Mary is sidelined by a badly sprained ankle. She quickly becomes bored and decides to investigate the contents of several packing crates and a trunk filled with memorabilia belonging to Holmes's great-uncle Hoarce Vernet. She doesn't find much of interest except for a silver lamp with a rotating shade. The lamp is a type of zoetrope which spins when strips of paper are inserted resulting in a type of moving image. She also finds a journal that appears to be written in code. Never one to run away from a challenge, Mary sets out to decipher the journal and finds that each of the twelve entries is built around an image, One is of a child being kidnapped. Who wrote the journal and how does it relate to great-uncle Horace? The only definite fact is that the child and her kidnapper go to India.
Mary and Holmes have to figure out the relationship between the child in India and the appearance of Indian men looking for Damian. What they find will shock them .
This was an enjoyable read with multiple characters and events that cover several time spans. I found that a bit disconcerting and sometimes had to go back to read an earlier section to clarify things. Other than that, those who have been following the series for 25 years won't be disappointed.
Thanks to Netgalley and Bantam for the ARC.

A dizzying, delightful kaleidoscope of a novel - 4.5 stars

I was very excited to read The Lantern’s Dance, the first new Mary Russell & Sherlock Holmes mystery since 2021’s Castle Shade. Once started, I could hardly put it down, staying up until 2:30 in the morning to reach the denouement. Like The Murder of Mary Russell, the novel alternates between past and present narratives, slowly revealing hidden connections that surprised and enchanted me.

Readers familiar with the Sherlock Holmes canon may recall that in “The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter,” Holmes divulges that his grandmother was “the sister of Vernet, the French artist”—probably Horace Vernert (though the Vernet family produced a number of artists through the generations.) From this single quotation and a few other tidbits about Holmes’s origins, Laurie R. King has woven an adventure involving an antique zoetrope, a coded journal, family secrets, missing jewels, and a thirst for revenge several generations in the making. Told from three points of view (Mary Russell, Holmes, and the journal’s author), The Lantern’s Dance is a dizzying, delightful kaleidoscope of a novel, where each new revelation paints the known facts in a different light.

The book begins with Russell and Holmes arriving at Holmes’s son Damian’s home in France, only to discover that the Adlers (Damian, his fiancée Dr. Aileen Hemmings, and his young daughter Estelle) have fled. On questioning the neighbors, Holmes and Mary learn that several foreign men, possibly Indians, have been seeking Damian for several weeks—around the same time that he received a trio of crates and a trunk once belonging to the artist Vernet. A break-in the previous night by a man dressed as a lascar (an Indian sailor) has sent the Adler family into hiding. Holmes immediately sets out to find and protect them, while Russell, hobbled by a sprained ankle, remains at the Adler home to explore the crates and see what can be learned locally. Discovering an old journal written in an obscure and fiendishly difficult code, she sets about decoding it. As she reads, Mary begins to suspect the journal is connected not only to the Vernet family, but to the present-day mystery and perhaps even to Holmes himself.

If I have any small quibble about the book, it’s that I would have liked to see more of the present-day Adlers, particularly the child. The short glimpses of her are as charming as her appearances in The God of the Hive, but far too few. I also would have enjoyed more interactions between Damian and Aileen, and between Damian and his father… though their few interchanges are handled well, and I appreciate the hints of growth in their relationship with one another. Still, this is first and foremost a Mary Russell novel; while we do spend time with Holmes, the focus leans toward both Mary and the journal.

The chapters rotate between the three points of view, with the journal chapters often followed by Mary’s thoughts on what she has translated thus far, and her own attempts to find out more about the men seeking Damian. This sometimes makes for slightly uneven pacing, but on the whole, King build the tension well. My only other quibble is that in one of the plotlines, the danger is overcome a little too easily and the tension fizzles out. But this is not, strictly speaking, a murder mystery; it’s more a series of puzzles both past and present, and the reader has all the fun of figuring out not only the solutions (who are the men seeking Damian, and why? Who is the mysterious journal writer?) but also how they may be connected. I did in fact manage to solve the majority of the interlocking puzzles myself, but I missed a few crucial pieces here and there, and therefore I thoroughly enjoyed the final denouement.

I recommend The Lantern’s Dance to all of Mary Russell’s many fans—you won’t be disappointed! But if you’ve never met Russell or Laurie King’s iteration of Holmes before, you should really start with the first book in the series, The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, and follow that up with (at a minimum) the short story “The Marriage of Mary Russell” and the two-part mystery contained in The Language of Bees and The God of the Hive; the last two give necessary background on Damian, Estelle (also known as Stella), and Aileen. But honestly, I urge you to read the entire series in order; it’s one of my favorite mystery series of all time, and the order actually does matter.

It's hard to imagine that Russell and Holmes are now in their eighteenth book, but even harder to imagine the mystery world without them. On their way home from adventures in Transylvania (<i>Castle Shade</i>), they plan to stop and spend some time with Damian Adler, the son of Holmes and Irene Adler. After enduring far too long a train journey, they arrive to find Damian and his family have gone into hiding after a break-in and some other odd occurrences. True to form, Holmes sets out to track down his missing relatives. Russell has been sidelined by a sprained ankle and decides to search the house for clues - either to the location of Damian, or to the nature of the threat that caused his flight.

The lantern from the title is discovered in Damian's studio among some crates that seem to have belonged to one of the family's antecedents, the artist Horace Vernet. Puzzled why a child's toy such as this zoetrope with its dancing figures is included, Russell goes through each item in the crates searching for clarification. What she finds is an encrypted journal that captures her curiosity and has her working long hours to decipher it. Will it help solve the current mystery, or is it just an old riddle from the past?

The action of the story is a balance between the present as Holmes and Russell each search for answers in different ways and locations, and the past as the entries in the journal are slowly decoded. For fans who particularly enjoyed learning more about Russell's past in <i>Locked Rooms</i>, this may have the same fascination as pieces of her partner's family story are uncovered.

Coming out just in time for Valentine's Day - pick up a copy for your favorite mystery lover!

Stylistically perfect, amusing, and engrossing, this Sherlock Holmes/Mary Russell genealogical mystery hits all the right plot notes and locales for an engaging and highlyl readable mystery.

Are you a fan of the Russell and Holmes series? Read this book right now! I enjoy the series but haven’t read them all (yet!) and had no trouble getting right into this story. I think it would have helped if I’d read the previous books referenced in the story, but it wasn’t absolutely necessary. I found this book to be mesmerizing. I couldn’t put it down. I don’t want to say too much, but this is a must read.

Thank you to Bantam Books and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book.

King does not disappoint fans of her Russell and Holmes mysteries in the eighteenth book in the series. The detective spouses find themselves embroiled in a curious case in 1920s France when a break-in occurs at the home of Damian Adler, Holmes's son. The intruder, an Indian man dressed as a lascar or sailor, was surprised by Damian and fled, but why did he break in? Holmes and Russell discover a long, complicated story behind the incident, revealing secrets about the Holmes family's past in the process.

King excels at creating puzzles to be solved by the master detectives, Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes. Her fans never tire of the adventures the famous pair share nor of their brilliance in solving cases. Her imagination creates a fascinating Holmes family history in her latest in the series, leaving readers craving more revelations in future cases for Russell and Holmes. Fans of historical mysteries and Sherlock Holmes will relish King's Russell and Holmes series.

#TheLantern'sDance #NetGalley

This was so much fun! Once I started, I didn’t put it down. Holmes fans will enjoy getting to see more about Holmes’ personal history and the continued story of his son with Irene Adler. And I enjoyed that it was his wife, Mary Russell, who really is responsible for disentangling the mystery.

I voluntarily reviewed an advanced reader copy of this book that I received from Netgalley; however, the opinions are my own and I did not receive any compensation for my review.

Eighteenth book in the series and still full of surprises! I loved this installment in the Mary Russell series. As Holmes is aging, we continue to get some family backstory - this time involving his mother and her untimely death when he was eleven years old. Love the rich settings, the depth of character development, the independent chapters of Russell and Holmes, but especially the historical storyline. 5 full stars!

When seeking entertainment, it's not entirely fair, I know, to have to consider a literary definition first -- but if you haven't yet fallen for the Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes series by Laurie R. King, which marks 30 years in 2024, you'll benefit from the definition of pastiche: "A pastiche is a work of visual art, literature, theatre, music, or architecture that imitates the style or character of the work of one or more other artists. Unlike parody, pastiche pays homage to the work it imitates, rather than mocking it." ...

Read the rest of this review at https://bethkanell.blogspot.com/2024/01/deepening-sherlock-holmes-new-from.html

Another amazing Russell and Holmes book! Books in this series often feel like delightful travelogues-this one is a travelogue through Holmes family history. This series (which has been going for 30 years!) is one of the best historical murder mystery series out there. Highly recommended.

It was a pleasure to once again spend time with Russell and Holmes!

This book featured a mystery within a mystery - of course, there is the main, overarching story centered around Holmes' son Damian and his family, originating in a small village in France. Then there is an additional mystery, springing from a journal that Russell found in the bottom of a crate of paintings, recorded in a complicated code that took her mental dexterity to crack, slowly revealing the development over time of a woman of extraordinary character. Russell struggles with being left behind (she had sustained an ankle injury prior to the start of this book), and her forays into the history of the journal serve to distract her from what Holmes is getting up to without her.

As the story progresses, both in the book and in the journal, you begin to see how the threads weave together to create a complete picture - neither Holmes nor Russell has enough information to see the full picture until they reunite in the last quarter of the book and everything starts to come together and they're able to resolve both mysteries.

I really enjoyed this installment in the series - we delve deeper into Holmes' history and complicated relationships with his son, the late Irene Adler, and his family. I only wish we had more time with Russell and Holmes together! I'm always fascinated by their dynamic, how they've grown as individuals and as a couple, and how they're able to put their minds together to solve any puzzle.

In this most family-focused book, Sherlock Holmes and Mary Russell arrive in France to visit Sherlock’s son, Damian, and granddaughter (!) --I thought I had read this entire series, but clearly I missed a couple of key installments). Upon arrival they discover that Damian and his family are away, having decamped after an attempted home invasion. Sherlock leaves to track them down and ensure their safety, while Mary, hobbled by a sprained ankle, stays behind to investigate some crates of mysterious items recently sent to Damian by the institute that had been holding them for years. Mary’s injury creates a good reason for the separation of tasks. As Sherlock tracks down Damian (taking some of the many trains in this book) and tries to convince him to lie low, Mary discovers a coded notebook and sets out to decipher it, revealing a family saga across continents and cultures. The evocative setting in the French countryside and the story of a life in India make for a rich and immersive read—less of a thriller and more of an engrossing multigenerational saga. As Mary’s ankle heals, her investigation grows more active and more similar in pace to previous books in this series, until finally she and Sherlock are reunited and attack the mystery together as in their usual partnership. The ending connects a number of threads and is most satisfying.

Thanks to Netgalley and Random House for a digital advance review copy.

This is a notable and worthy addition to King's exploration of Sherlock Holmes. It's not especially action packed, or even mysterious, but character development, and exploration of character history, is well done.

I am a huge fan of Laurie R King's Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes series and found it at the time that O Jerusalem (book #5) was published. I've had this series on auto-buy ever since. The later books in the series have settled into a different pace than earlier books but are no less enjoyable and The Lantern's Dance is no exception.

Fans of the Arthur Conan Doyle Sherlock Holmes series will find a Sherlock Holmes they both recognize and love in Laurie R King's series. Laurie R King is an exceptional writer who manages to deliver new characters and plots which are fully-developed and enjoyable while remaining true to the ACD cannon. While The Lantern's Dance can be read as a stand-alone familiarity with the series (and to some extent the ACD cannon) will make for a much more enjoyable and richer reading experience. If you haven't read the series yet, start with The Beekeeper's Apprentice.

The Lantern's Dance was a solid 4.5 star rating for me until she nailed the ending. 5 stars.

Thank you to Net Galley and Random House for an early review copy of The Lantern's Dance.

The Lantern Dance is the 18th Mary Russell novel, and it’s an interesting one. I’ve been reading the Mary Russell novels since I was twelve (for context: I am now thirty-five), and this one stands out from the others because its style is so very different. On the surface, it seems like your typical Russell – Holmes and Russell are in a new country, having just come from another country, and a mystery is to be solved. Except the mystery itself is so very different from the types we find in previous books that I barely feel like it counts. In truth, this Russell is more of a family study and a character study more than anything, with undercurrents of a study in how cultures and societies change over the course of a century. It’s a quieter novel, with less explosive action and diabolical mysteries happening; even the actual crime is handled quickly, and the codebreaking is done almost entirely off page. What matters in this book is people, not crime; while the Russell books have always cared about people, the crime is usually the vehicle by which we get to know everyone, and this book stands out for that not being the case. And I did love the characters. The mysterious Lakshmi is delightful, and the people we meet through her journal are fascinating, complex, interesting people. I enjoyed spending more time with Damian Adler, though I wish Estelle and Aileen had been on the page more.

I think people who want a classic Russell may be disappointed in this book, but I am incredibly intrigued. I am hoping that LRK uses the next Russell novel to build on this one, because it FEELS like setup for the next book; I also hope that the ending sentence of this book points to something happening in the next book that I have been desperately hoping for since book ten. (I do feel like every review I have written for the Russell books over the past several years has been hoping for that payoff; I probably need to let go of the hope that I will ever get it and admit that these books just aren’t interested in it, even if I am.) I do feel that this book was too short in some ways; it is, to my estimation, the second shortest Russell novel, with only Garment of Shadows being shorter. The ending was very abrupt, to the point where I thought I was missing some pages. If the book had even just had 40-50 more pages, I think it would have had a stronger, more conclusive ending, which will be especially important if the next book goes off in another direction. Sometimes I feel like I cannot properly review a Russell until the next book comes out, letting me know if there are just loose threads left, or if the author picked up those threads in the next one.

Despite some of my qualms about endings and loose threads, I very much enjoyed my time with this book. I love the LRK decided to pick up a not-uncommon idea in Holmesiana (as she notes in her author’s notes) and add it to the canon she’s created. I hope she’ll do something further with it and make the events of this book matter in the novels to come, rather than have it just be a single point of interest that is never addressed again. I’m looking forward to adding the finished book to my collection once it releases. Thanks to NetGalley for providing an eARC. All thoughts are my own.

I received an advance copy of this book from the publisher.
Brief summary:
Homes and Russell are going to visit Holmes' son Damian and his family in a small French village.
But when they get their Damian is gone with his family after someone breaks into the house. Russell is left behind with a sprained ankle while Holmes goes after his son. And the adventure begins.....

This was a very interesting adventure because I couldn't tell if there was danger there or it was imagined. I loved Russell delving into deciphering the journal instead of waiting around. She is so good at puzzles. The second story in the story is the Journal and it felt so real and exciting. The adventure turned more personal than either of them expected and I liked that part. It was good to see some backstory that build on the Doyle "canon". Damien seems to hold a lot of anger towards his dad for not being perfect--which no parent is. But maybe he's finally starting to understand him.

I loved the glimpses into the Indian society under British rule and the description of the caste system. I would have loved more of the story taking place there but I think there are adventures there that we might find out about later.

I totally loved this book and was so happy to get a chance to read it before it is released. I can't wait to see where Laurie King will take this interesting family.

The eighteenth adventure of Mary Russel and Sherlock Holmes has them making a visit to the home of Sherlock's son Damian Adler who is an artist. When they arrive at Damian's home, they discover that the family - Damian, his young daughter Estelle, and his fiancee Dr. Aileen Henning - have left abruptly leaving behind their shotgun-carrying handyman.

Apparently, a middle of the night intruder bearing a machete has caused the family to flee. Luckily, the handyman has instructions for when Russell and Holmes arrive. Holmes fears that the intruder was someone from the cult he and Russell had exposed and who might have a reason to seek revenge on Damian. He determines to go to his son and family and find them a safe place before he returns to discover who the intruder was.

Meanwhile, Mary who has a badly sprained ankle will remain behind and explore some boxes that Damian recently retrieved from the French art institute that were left there until claimed by someone named Adler or Holmes.

Mary discovers that the crates contain a variety of detritus including a number of paintings by various Vernets - a family of French artists with a connection to Sherlock. Among the contents of the chests is a journal written in code which, if uncoded, will tell a lot about the past, Sherlock's history, and even what is causing the current troubles.

This was an excellent and engaging episode in this long-running series. I loved learning more about Sherlock's past. I loved Mary's determination to decode that journal and follow the clues. Anything more about her discoveries in the journals would be a spoiler and I don't want to do that. I loved the way the story slowly unfolded until its rather surprising ending.