One Must Tell the Bees
J. Lawrence Matthews
19 hours 14 minutes
East Dean Press
publisher May 22, 2021
About the book:
One Must Tell the Bees is the untold story of Sherlock Holmes’ journey from the streets of London to the White House of Abraham Lincoln and, in company with a freed slave named after the dead president, their breathtaking pursuit and capture of John Wilkes Booth. It is the very first case of the man who would become known to the world as Sherlock Holmes, and as listeners will discover, it will haunt him until his very last.
My review
I am really torn on this one. I always seem to love a book in a book and the weaving of a story around Abraham Lincoln gave me the feels that I last remember when seeing Hamilton. But at over 19 hours, it is not for the faint of heart. Not sure if it should have been broken down into more than one book or edited, but I found myself listening and then taking breaks from this one. I can’t really pinpoint if it was the idea in the back of my mind with the daunting length or something else.
In addition to weaving Sherlock Holmes into the events at the end of the civil war and the assassination, it also brings up a lot of history of Sherlock Holmes and weaves that through the story. I really did like the elements of Holmes and Lincoln woven so seamlessly into the story. And I love when there’s an aha moment when the title makes sense.
If you are a civil war buff or a lover of Sherlock Holmes and love a long book, you should like this one.
Jeff Matthews
Thank you, Sherry. It is long. But I felt I couldn’t tell one story without the other–it seemed to me the reader needed an occasional break from the American story (there are three such breaks and one minor interruption near the end), or else it might seem too far-fetched to continue with. Strange as it may seem, I had in mind the first Godfather movie, in which the dark, intense American story is broken up by moving the action to Italy, where Michael Corleone is in hiding and gets married. The Italian scenes are light and mostly funny or poignant, and provide a welcome rest from the bloody American mob scenes.
In any event, thank you for listening all 19 hours! I thought Thomas Judd, the narrator, did an excellent job voicing so many different characters. I hope you agree