The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
By far, this is the most un-PC of the Sherlock Holmes oeuvre. Blacks, Jews and women are all treated poorly. Sherlock even ridicules a black man over the size of his lips, which I’m still a little dazed about.
Setting aside the more questionable attitudes, the stories themselves are sub-par, and are not rooted in a single era of Holmes life, as the other collections seem to be. There are some from the early era, when Watson roomed with Holmes at Baker Street, some from after Watson got married, and one after Holmes’ retirement, when Watson wasn’t even in the picture (one of the few (only?) narrated by Homes himself.
In order to read this, I had to actually make a purchase. I picked up “Sherlock Holmes: The Complete Novels and Stories, Volume 2” from Borders. The Case-Book is the last collection in Volume 2 (of 2), and is rarely mentioned and not available as a standalone book as far as I can gather. All of which leads me to believe that this is the rock-bottom remainders of the Sherlock Holmes world, the dredges that only the Homes afficionados care to undertake.
All in all, a very skippable volume, except perhaps as a character study of the author himself, rooted firmly in his bygone era.