This collection featuring legendary consulting detective Sherlock Holmes includes the short stories "The Adventure of the Mazarin Stone" and "The Problem of Thor Bridge."In "The Adventure of the Mazarin Stone," Dr. Watson arrives at 221B Baker Street to find his old friend and colleague keen on a case. Holmes has taken it upon himself to find the missing Crown diamond, the Mazarin stone, which has been stolen by swarthy big-game hunter Count Negretto Sylvius. When the count pays Ho...

Occasionally, the rugged landscape of Scotland attracts dreamers who move north, wrapped in fantasies of enjoying the simple life. They usually don’t last, defeated by the climate or by inhospitable locals. But it looks as if Effie Garrand has come to stay.When local constable Hamish Macbeth calls on her, he is amazed to find the small woman still in residence after a particularly hideous winter. Unfortunately, Effie is also quite delusional, having convinced herself—and everyone e...

In the isolated villages in the north of Scotland, the villagers rely on the services of the chimney sweep, Pete Ray, and his old-fashioned brushes. Pete is always able to find work in the Scottish highlands—until the day that Police Constable Hamish Macbeth notices blood dripping onto the floor of a villager's fireplace and a dead body stuffed inside the chimney.The entire town of Lochdubh is certain Pete is the culprit, but Hamish doesn't believe that the affable chimney sweep is...

Amazing news has spread across the Scottish countryside. The most famous of highland bachelors, police sergeant Hamish Macbeth, will be married at last. Everyone in the village of Lochdubh adores Josie McSween, Macbeth's newest constable and blushing bride-to-be.While locals think Josie is quite a catch, Hamish has a case of prenuptial jitters. After all, if it weren't for the recent murder of a beautiful woman in a neighboring village, there wouldn't be a wedding at all. For it wa...

Hamish Macbeth, constable in the remote Scottish highlands village of Lochdubh, loves his job amongst his mostly happy neighbors—until murder taints the town.Mrs. Gillespie is famous for being the best maid in the northwest of Sutherland. But to Hamish Macbeth, she is a malicious gossip who bangs around the furniture and clanks pots. When Hamish wins Mrs. Gillespie’s services in a church raffle, he spends most of the day trying to avoid her. He doesn’t understand h...

Sherlock Holmes is at it again in “The Adventure of the Mazarin Stone.”Dr. Watson arrives at 221B Baker Street to find his old friend and colleague keen on a case. Holmes has taken it upon himself to find the missing Crown diamond, the Mazarin stone, which has been stolen by swarthy big-game hunter Count Negretto Sylvius. When the count pays Holmes a visit, the brilliant detective must rely on his cleverness to learn the jewel’s location and wrap up the case.

In “The Problem of Thor Bridge,” Neil Gibson, who has earned the nickname the Gold King for his status as the world’s greatest gold-mining magnate, seeks Sherlock Holmes’ help in finding his wife’s real killer. His governess, Miss Dunbar, has been convicted of the crime due to an abundance of evidence against her—including a gun in her wardrobe—but Gibson believes her innocent. A few enlightening revelations, including the unhappy state of the Gibsons’ marriage, lead Holmes and Watson down...

When Scotland is hit by recession, police constable Hamish Macbeth notices that the Highland people are forced to come up with inventive ways to lure tourists to their sleepy towns. The quaint village of Braikie doesn't have much to offer, other than a place of rare beauty called Buchan's Wood, which was bequeathed to the town. The savvy local tourist director renames the woods "The Fairy Glen," and has brochures printed with a beautiful photograph of a kingfisher rising from a pond on the...

Please note: In S., J.J. Abrams and Doug Dorst conceived of a multi-layered novel-within-a-novel that involves handwritten notes in the margins and physical objects slipped between the pages. Because an audio edition is unable to recreate those innately visual pieces and thus the full experience of S., only the text of Ship of Theseus, the novel at the heart of S., has been recorded here.Award-winning actor Graeme Malcolm reads the work of an incendiary n...

Tom Patey, one of Scotland’s foremost climbers and mountaineers, was legendary for his pioneering ascents and boundless enthusiasm, and his carefree approach and ability to burn the candle at both ends. "A Short Walk With Whillans" was originally published in the Scottish Mountaineering Club Journal in 1963.

When John Heppel, a visiting writer to Lochdubh, first proposes forming a writers’ circle, the idea is met with much enthusiasm from local residents. However, once the classes get underway, attendance quickly falters due to one undeniable fact: John Heppel is a long-winded, consummate bore. But is dullness a motive for murder? Hamish Macbeth wouldn’t ordinarily think so, therefore when Heppel is found dead, Hamish begins looking for deeper meaning in the writer’s stories, including a stran...

Gentle by name, gentle by nature. Everyone in the sleepy Scottish town of Lochdubh adores elderly Mrs. Gentle—everyone but Hamish Macbeth, that is. Hamish thinks the gentle lady is quite sly and vicious, and the citizens of Lochdubh think he is overly cranky. Perhaps it’s time for him to get married, they say.But who has time for marriage when there’s a murder to be solved? When Mrs. Gentle dies under mysterious circumstances, the town is shocked and outraged. Chief Detective Inspe...