It started captivating but, I got bored in the middle. Hence the three stars. Still, a good story overall. ( )

The Classified Dossier: Sherlock Holmes and Count Dracula by Christian Klaver is a 2021 Titan Books publication.

The previously classified files of Sherlock Holmes are released by Dr. Watson after Holmes’ death. These ‘black box’ cases are preternatural and utterly shocking!!

First up is a most unusual case that finds Sherlock Holmes working with the most famous vampire in the world- Count Dracula -and his bride- Mina.

A renegade group of vampires is on the loose and Dracula’s beloved Mina has been kidnapped. Even one of the most feared beings on earth turns to Sherlock Holmes for help- naturally!

Of all the fictional characters in the world, Sherlock Holmes and Dracula top the list for the most incarnations- or pastiches- out there.

Naturally, someone would want to pit the two against one another at some point- and they did- Loren Estleman for one, back in the late 1970s- for example.

I know what you’re thinking- because I was thinking the same thing when I heard about the Holmes/Dracula takeoffs. Isn’t this a little like ‘jumping the shark’?

As it turns out Estleman’s book was fairly well received by readers, believe it or not. Now Christian Klaver has taken a jab at combining the two most notorious fictional characters in one novel.

I confess to enjoying various spins on the Sherlock Holmes series and have immense respect for the great detective and his massive stamp on crime fiction- but I’m not an aficionado by any stretch of the imagination.

While I have been curious about some of the older pastiches of the Holmes/Dracula theme, I must confess I approached this one with a fair amount caution, not knowing exactly how the author intended to approach the material.

It’s a horror/fantasy story featuring two of the most infamous characters in fiction, and the author approached the fantastical premise seriously.

While Dracula’s crimes are not dismissed out of hand, he is the least of our worries, making him more of an ally than an enemy, which was interesting, but I wasn’t crazy about the fate of some of the other important characters, to be honest, and was never fully able to accept the idea of it.

To be honest, I chose this book for two reasons- I thought this might be a good ‘Halloween’ read, for one- but mostly, it was out of curiosity.

I was surprised that the story turned out to be more engrossing than I had anticipated. While some Sherlockian experts might be a little harder to please, for me the book was entertaining and a nice change of pace!!

3.5 stars ( )