One of my Facebook friends messaged me to ask an interesting question – how does the canon influence my writing? I thought, ah-ha! Great idea for a blog…

The canon is always at the heart of anything I write with regard to Sherlock Holmes. I just like to put my own spin on things.

For some, the goal is to recreate the voice of the original stories so accurately that when people read it, they feel like they have stumbled across a lost work by Doyle – or even Watson himself.

I greatly admire those who take this approach, even more so if they manage to pull it off. But for me, the creative challenge lay in not trying to replicate, but rather trying to innovate – take the canon as a starting point and re-tell it in a fresh new way which would appeal to not only existing fans…