Mr. Fairlie's Final Journey is the first Solar Pons novel, and one is driven to conclude (a view in which the author concurs) that the novel is not the best form for a Solar Pons adventure—any more than, with the exception of The Hound of the Baskervilles, it was the best form for a Sherlock Holmes adventure. (p. 758)
A Praed Street Dossier is an out-of-the-way sort of work, not a collection of adventures (except for the last 24 pages of the book, which contain two collaborative science-fiction detective stories, comprising what is surely one of the few attempts at this genre and even more surely one of the few successful attempts), but the raw material for a collection. Along with the section on the creation of Solar Pons, and the sciencefiction detection, about half the book … is devoted to the journal of Dr. Lyndon Parker—the Pontine Watson—in the first year … of his association with Pons. Apart from the fact that it makes pleasant reading, the journal is worth noting for Mr. Derleth's strong defense of capital punishment.
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