Discovering Dorothy Gilman

It was an old, old-looking book - a Fawcett paperback printed in the 60's - lurking between much larger volumes in a remote, dusty bookcase. The cover was loose, the pages browned, the print tiny. But the title: The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax, was irresistable. I drew it out and put it on my desk for future consideration. Finally, about three days ago, I finished all my other reading projects and picked it up.  

"Unexpected" is the operative word. It's a whodunnit on par with "Murder, She Wrote." A retired lady roughly my age ditches the garden club circuit to seek adventure. Somehow she scores an interview at the Langley CIA headquarters. Though not in the least taken seriously, she ends up on a mission anyway when mistaken for the agent actually intended for the job. Needless to say, things go south in a hurry.

Despite her gentility and naivete, she proves to be remarkably resourceful. It was a delightful, albeit suspenseful, romp. The only thing that bothered me was the dialog. The words of Mrs. Pollifax were totally in character, but not even back in the 50's and 60's would a seasoned American agent on his home turf use "quite so" and "rather" in the manner of a cultivated mid-century Englishman. I was convinced Miss Gilman was either a Brit or overly influenced by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

The truth is that Dorothy Gilman was born June 25, 1923, in New Brunswick, NJ, and lived mainly in Maine and Connecticut. I was startled to learn that she only recently passed away on February 2, 2012.  She wrote a whole series on Mrs. Pollifax along with several childrens' books and other mystery novels. Needless to say, I've hopped onto Amazon and ordered three more Mrs. Pollifax titles.

Sherlock Holmes: The detective who was forbidden to die

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

In 1893, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle decided to kill off his most famous creation: detective Sherlock Holmes.  Six years of writing these cleverly concocted mysteries, he explained in a letter to his mother, had left him weary of the character.  Thus, in The Adventure of the Final Problem, Holmes and his nemesis, Prof. Moriarty, plunge over a Swiss waterfall while locked in combat.


Basil Rathbone as Holmes

Obviously Sir Arthur seriously underestimated Holmes’ popularity.  Shocked to the point of wearing black armbands, Doyle’s readership launched a stunning protest.  Even Queen Victoria was not amused, personally requesting the author to revive the legendary detective.

Caving to the outcry, Doyle penned The Hound of the Baskervilles in 1901, as a prequel to previously published adventures.  But that wasn’t good enough.  Clamoring fans wanted Holmes alive.

"We are not amused"

So Doyle dutifully produced The Adventure of the Empty House, wherein Holmes explains he’d flung Moriarty down the falls and then faked his own death to escape the professor’s henchmen.  With satisfied fans back on board (and a record sum of money from his publisher) Doyle continued writing Sherlock Holmes adventures, stopping only three years before his own death in 1930.

 Sherlock holmes, however, is still going strong.