Holmes, Marple & Poe: The Greatest Crime-Solving Team of the Twenty-First Century

Holmes, Marple & Poe draws upon the literary celebrity of Arthur Conan Doyle’s fictional detective Sherlock Holmes, Agatha Christie’s fictional sleuth Miss Marple, and American author Edgar Allan Poe. Poe is more commonly known for his gothic fiction and horror (such as “The Pit and the Pendulum,” one of the stories referenced in Holmes, Marple & Poe). Nevertheless, Poe is also commonly considered the father of modern detective fiction; allusions to Poe mysteries, such as “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” appear in Patterson and Sitts’s interpretation.

Sherlock Holmes is perhaps the most famous detective in literary history; this late Victorian character has been adapted numerous times across media including plays, television, and film. Holmes’s original author, Arthur Conan Doyle, wrote 58 short stories and four novellas featuring the detective, starting in 1887 with A Study in Scarlet and ending in 1927 with the lesser-known “The Adventure of Shoscombe Old Place.” The original Holmes is known for his keen eye for detail, which allows him to make seemingly impossible logical deductions in obscure cases. He is also famed for esoteric knowledge (such as a comprehensive study of forms of ashes) that aid him in his detecting.

Christie’s 66 detective novels and 14 short stories make her the author most associated with the golden age of detective fiction, traditionally located in the early 20th century. Miss Marple, though not as famous as Christie’s recurring detective Hercule Poirot, appears in 12 novels and 20 stories. An elderly, unmarried woman of independent means, Miss Marple uses her study of human nature to solve crimes in her village of St. Mary Mead. Miss Marple first appears in the 1930 novel Murder at the Vicarage, though subsequent appearances show her to be softer and kinder than she appears in her debut.