Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

Unlike Rankin, who only put his pet detective out to grass, Conan Doyle deliberately killed his off to give himself a break. People who've never read any Sherlock Holmes know about that famous struggle above the Reichenbach Falls which ends with Holmes and Moriarty pitching headlong to their deaths. Eventually Conan Doyle was persuaded to resurrect Holmes and write another 56 stories, the first of which, "The Adventure of the Empty House", has Dr Watson recalling the day his domineering roommate returned from the grave. Funny, I thought I'd read the entire Sherlock Holmes canon at school - he was my second-best hero after Biggles - but I clearly haven't. Did you know that in that missing decade the famous Baker Street gumshoe travelled extensively to Tibet and Mecca, went to see the Caliph of Khartoum and worked on coal tar derivatives in Montpellier? No, of course you didn't, which is why you should listen to these wonderfully atmospheric period pieces bristling with melodrama and characters running in crying "Mr Holmes, the most extraordinary and tragic affair has occurred during the night. It is the most unheard-of business. We can only regard it as a special providence that you should chance to be here at the time for in all England you are the one man we need." Edward Hardwicke has the perfect voice for this: resonant, old-fashioned, precise - everyone's idea of a Victorian gent.