| Plot Summary of Holmes On The Range |
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"In Steve Hockensmith's debut novel he mixes mystery and a fun western yarn in Holmes On the Range. The book opens up with Big Red (Otto Amlingmeyer) explaining how his brother Old Red (Gustav Amlingmeyer) got interested in being a detective after Otto read Gustav the Sherlock Holmes story The Red-Headed League. The cowpokes soon get hired for the Bar VR ranch for five dollars a week. Not long after they arrive, Big Red and Old Red find the mangled corpse of manager, Perkins. This motivates Old Red to investigate and soon the corpse of another worker on the ranch is found dead. It's here that the owner of the land makes a bet with his underling Brackwell that the brothers will not solve the case. Bid Red and Old Red then stop their duties on the farm and go full time into investigating the murders, solving the riddles in a plausible manner for the Duke."
Bobby Blades, Resident Scholar
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"There's no doubt about it—something mighty peculiar is going on at the Bar VR cattle spread, something that would take a Sherlock Holmes to figure out.
Only Sherlock is busy elsewhere, so readers of Holmes on the Range are going to have to settle for Old Red, all of 27 and a devotee of the great detective's stories, and his younger brother, Big Red, a Watson-in-training. It's a pretty good compromise.
Times are tough in 1893 Montana when the Amlingmeyer brothers, all that's left of a family decimated by disease and flood, sign on at the secretive ranch, run by the nasty McPherson boys for the absentee British owners. The brothers and a handful of other drovers recruited from the Hornet's Nest saloon aren't at the Bar VR before a body, trampled to pulp, is found out on the range, following a big storm. Old Red is suspicious.
But before he can start to do much in the way of detecting, the owners of the Bar VR just happen to show up: the pompous Duke, his daughter Lady Clara, her would-be suitor Young Blackwell, the mysterious, tight-lipped Mr. Edwards, and their retinue. Throw in a handful of other colorful characters—Boudreaux, an albino Negro cowpuncher, and Hungry Bob, a reputed cannibal at large--and the stage is set for a story that twists and turns its way like a rain-carved gully through dusty sage plains.
This may also be the first locked room mystery where the room is an outhouse.
But what makes this story special is the dialog, the rhythms of cow talk and Big Red's sassy, cynical take on a life that is hard under the best of circumstances. The mystery is indeed a good, complex one, but of the “all is revealed in the last two chapters” sort.
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Jon Kapecki, Resident Scholar
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| Review Analysis of Holmes On The Range |
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Our unique search engine provides a wealth of detail about books by breaking them down into many different literary elements, all of which are searchable (click here).
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Ratings are on a 1-10 scale (Low to High)
Plot
Composition of Book
descript. of violence and chases - 20%
Planning/preparing, gather info, debate puzzles/motives - 35%
Feelings, relationships, character bio/development - 25%
How society works & physical descript. (people, objects, places) - 20%
Tone of story
- very humorous
How difficult to spot villain?
- Difficult, but some clues given
- Challenging
Time/era of story:
- 19th century
- american wild west
What % of story relates directly
to the mystery, not the subplot?
- 60%
- 70%
Kind of investigator
- amateur citizen investigator
Kid or adult book?
- Adult or Young Adult Book
Any non-mystery subplot?
- life in that culture
Crime Thriller
Yes
Murder Mystery (killer unknown)
Yes
Main Character
Gender
- Male
Age:
- 20's-30's
Is this an ordinary person caught up in events?
Yes
How much violence does he/she use?
- none
- a little
Ethnicity/Race
- White/American
How sensitive is this character?
- sensitive to others' feelings
- middling sensitive to others' feelings
Sense of humor
- Cynical sense of humor
Intelligence
- Average intelligence
Physique
- average physique
- quite fatty
Main Adversary
Identity:
- none
- Male
Age:
- 40's-50's
How much of work is main antagonist actually present in:
- a moderate amount
Motive of antagonist
- revenge
How sensitive is this character?
- middling sensitive to others' feelings
Intelligence
- Smarter than most other characters
Setting
United States
Yes
The US:
- Midwest
- West
Farm/Ranch?
Yes
Farm/Ranch:
- ranch
Style
Person
- mostly 1st
Accounts of torture and death?
- moderately detailed references to deaths
- very gorey descriptions deaths/dead bodies
How many deaths?
- 2
- 3-4
Unusual forms of death
- crushed
- perforation--bullets
Unusual form of death?
Yes
Amount of dialog
- roughly even amounts of descript and dialog
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