Ronald Adair, a quiet young man whose only hobby was playing cards, got killed. Watson attempted to crack the case but with no success. One day he decided to examine the area around the victim’s house and then he ran into a strange old man. Who is he? Can it be the murderer who came back to the crime scene in disguise? Or the old man is simply a witness? Will Watson find out what happened by applying Holmes’ methods or this will not be enough? You can find the answers in "The Adventure of the Empty House" which is a part of "The Return of Sherlock Holmes". Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930) was born in Scotland and studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh. After his studies, he worked as a ship’s surgeon on various boats. During the Second Boer War, he was an army doctor in South Africa. When he came back to the United Kingdom, he opened his own practice and started writing crime books. He is best known for his thrilling stories about the adventures of Sherlock Holmes. He published four novels and more than 50 short-stories starring the detective and Dr Watson, and they play an important role in the history of crime fiction. Other than the Sherlock Holmes series, Doyle wrote around thirty more books, in genres such as science-fiction, fantasy, historical novels, but also poetry, plays, and non-fiction.

Winner of the 2022 National Book Award for Translated Literature A blazing new story collection that will make you feel like the house is collapsing in on you, from the 3 time International Booker Prize finalist, "lead[ing] a vanguard of Latin American writers forging their own 21st-century canon.” –O, the Oprah magazine The seven houses in these seven stories are strange. A person is missing, or a truth, or memory; some rooms are enticing, some unmoored, others empty. But in Samanta Schweblin's tense, visionary tales, something always creeps back inside: a ghost, a fight, trespassers, a list of things to do before you die, a child's first encounter with darkness or the fallibility of parents. In each story, twists and turns will unnerve and surprise: Schweblin never takes the expected path and instead digs under the skin, revealing surreal truths about our sense of home, of belonging, and of the fragility of our connections with others. This is a masterwork from one of our most brilliant modern writers.

1903 saw The Adventure of The Empty House and the return of Sherlock Holmes to 221b Baker Street where he explains the deception of his death at the Reichenbach Falls to his faithful friend Dr John Watson. 2012 sees The Crime of The Empty House where the former home of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Undershaw, lies in disrepair and the threat of being destroyed forever. Commissioned by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle himself, Undershaw was witness to the creation of many of his most famous works, including The Hound of the Baskervilles and The Return of Sherlock Holmes. It is a building deserving preservation for the British nation, and indeed the world, for all time. Sadly, the building is currently under threat from the property developers who wish to divide the house into 3 separate units and build a further 5 alongside. Planning permission for development has already been approved by Waverley Borough Council. The Undershaw Preservation Trust (UPT), with Mark Gatiss [BBC Sherlock] as Patron, is dedicated to the preservation and protection of this important literary building and are campaigning to get this decision overturned, so the house can be restored to its original glory and enjoyed as the single dwelling Sir Arthur Conan Doyle intended it to be. This book is a collection of short Sherlock Holmes stories and poems written by fans from around the world in support of the Save Undershaw campaign - even the cover has been designed by fans. Royalties from the book go towards the UPT to preserve this wonderful house for future generations of Doyleans, Sherlock Holmes enthusiasts and literary fans of all kinds. More information on the Save Undershaw campaign can be found on their website: www.saveundershaw.com.

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY Janet Maslin, The New York Times • St. Louis Post-Dispatch When Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Bill Dedman noticed in 2009 a grand home for sale, unoccupied for nearly sixty years, he stumbled through a surprising portal into American history. Empty Mansions is a rich mystery of wealth and loss, connecting the Gilded Age opulence of the nineteenth century with a twenty-first-century battle over a $300 million inheritance. At its heart is a reclusive heiress named Huguette Clark, a woman so secretive that, at the time of her death at age 104, no new photograph of her had been seen in decades. Though she owned palatial homes in California, New York, and Connecticut, why had she lived for twenty years in a simple hospital room, despite being in excellent health? Why were her valuables being sold off? Was she in control of her fortune, or controlled by those managing her money? Dedman has collaborated with Huguette Clark’s cousin, Paul Clark Newell, Jr., one of the few relatives to have frequent conversations with her. Dedman and Newell tell a fairy tale in reverse: the bright, talented daughter, born into a family of extreme wealth and privilege, who secrets herself away from the outside world. Huguette was the daughter of self-made copper industrialist W. A. Clark, nearly as rich as Rockefeller in his day, a controversial senator, railroad builder, and founder of Las Vegas. She grew up in the largest house in New York City, a remarkable dwelling with 121 rooms for a family of four. She owned paintings by Degas and Renoir, a world-renowned Stradivarius violin, a vast collection of antique dolls. But wanting more than treasures, she devoted her wealth to buying gifts for friends and strangers alike, to quietly pursuing her own work as an artist, and to guarding the privacy she valued above all else. The Clark family story spans nearly all of American history in three generations, from a log cabin in Pennsylvania to mining camps in the Montana gold rush, from backdoor politics in Washington to a distress call from an elegant Fifth Avenue apartment. The same Huguette who was touched by the terror attacks of 9/11 held a ticket nine decades earlier for a first-class stateroom on the second voyage of the Titanic. Empty Mansions reveals a complex portrait of the mysterious Huguette and her intimate circle. We meet her extravagant father, her publicity-shy mother, her star-crossed sister, her French boyfriend, her nurse who received more than $30 million in gifts, and the relatives fighting to inherit Huguette’s copper fortune. Richly illustrated with more than seventy photographs, Empty Mansions is an enthralling story of an eccentric of the highest order, a last jewel of the Gilded Age who lived life on her own terms. Praise for Empty Mansions “An amazing story of profligate wealth . . . an outsized tale of rags-to-riches prosperity.”—The New York Times “An evocative and rollicking read, part social history, part hothouse mystery, part grand guignol.”—The Daily Beast “Fascinating . . . [a] haunting true-life tale.”—People “One of those incredible stories that you didn’t even know existed. It filled a void.”—Jon Stewart, The Daily Show “Thrilling . . . deliciously scandalous.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)