Doyle is always precise, curt and suspenseful when writing Sherlock Holmes. This prose always draws you right in, and chaperones you from one chapter to the next, and takes you through the chicanes of the plot. The Sign of Four, like other Holmes stories, is a balance of a well-crafted plot, well-rounded minor characters and villains and the gravity of its two leads.
However, compared to his other stories, I’ve liked the Sign of Four the least (not to say that I didn’t enjoy it). A Study in Scarlet had the origin aspect, as well as the stunning second half; Hounds had a Gothic horror-like element and Adventures was a wonderful tapestry. Signs has elements which make it a classic: the sense of an impossible case, the promise of a wild treasure, the prose. But for me it lacks the unique colour that set the other books I’ve read apart.
It also has the predictability of a standard detective novel: the gullible and arrogant officer, the red herring, the damsel in distress, the expository scene to the initial tragedy — but it lent itself to other detective novels for decades to come, as Doyle borrowed from Poe’s Dupin, and in turn created a far superior character.
I recommend getting the Penguin edition with the essay by Russell Miller, “Enter Sherlock Holmes”, which explains the evolution of the detective novel, from trashy into literature. It also covers Doyle’s determination to be an established writer, to appear in Blackwood magazine and to publish the now obscure Micah Clarke. It is also a revealing piece about the flaws of Holmes’s character and Doyle’s writing. But all this is forgivable — I have always gotten a lot out of reading Sherlock Holmes.
