Send us a Text Message.
Tea, Tonic, and Toxin is a book club and podcast for anyone who loves mysteries and detective stories. We’re making our way through the 19th-century stories that helped the genre evolve. Next up: Arthur Conan Doyle’s 1902 novel, The Hound of the Baskervilles.
This turn-of-the-century, Gothic-inspired spine-tingler includes a spectral hound and a decidedly hands-off Sherlock Holmes. The Hound of the Baskervilles is considered by many to be Arthur Conan Doyle’s best — and one of the most gripping and suspenseful murder mysteries ever written.
How to Read It: Buy it on Amazon, find a copy at a used bookstore, or read it for free (courtesy of Project Gutenberg).
Estimated Reading Time: 4 hours. Share your thoughts and check out the questions below!
Brain Attic: Holmes says, “Intense mental concentration has a curious way of blotting out what has passed. The barrister who … is able to argue with an expert upon his own subject finds that a week or two of the courts will drive it all out of his head once more. So each of my cases displaces the last.”
Lies and Deceit: Even though The Hound of the Baskervilles emphasizes the importance of truth and justice, almost everyone lies in the book. The Barrymores lie about Selden, the Stapletons lie about their relationship (and about most everything else), Watson lies to Mr. Frankland, and Holmes lies to Watson. When is deceit justified?
Aiding and Abetting: Barrymore says Watson shouldn’t have hunted the murderer, Selden. Henry says they might have kept quiet if Barrymore had told the secret of his own free will. Barrymore says Selden is heading to South America and turning him in would only get the Barrymores in trouble. Watson says Selden’s departure would “relieve the tax-payer of a burden.” Watson even pities Selden on the rainy moors, noting, “Whatever his crimes, he has suffered something to atone for them.” Keep in mind that Watson remembers Selden’s case well “on account of the peculiar ferocity of the crime and the wanton brutality.” So many sketchy rationalizations …
The Ties That Bind: Mrs. Barrymore’s brother was a violent murderer, but she grieves his death, for to her “he always remained the little wilful boy of her own girlhood, the child who had clung to her hand.” Watson writes, “Evil indeed is the man who has not one woman to mourn him.” Selden has Mrs. Barrymore to mourn him. Stapleton has no one. Did you see Stapleton as more evil than Selden? How far would you go to protect one you love?
Hell Hath No Fury Like a Woman Scorned: Does Stapleton’s poor treatment of Beryl and Laura Lyons relieve either woman of responsibility in helping him? Are they accessories to murder?
Supernatural Horror: In the intro to The Big Bow Mystery, Israel Zangwill said mysteries should have a “pervasive atmosphere of horror and awe such as Poe manages to create.” How would you describe the atmosphere in Baskervilles? At one point, Mortimer says, “There is a realm in which the most acute and most experienced of detectives is helpless.” What if Holmes had found no rational explanation for the events on the moor? How shocked would you have been if the story included an actual
Support the Show.
https://www.instagram.com/teatonicandtoxin/
https://www.facebook.com/teatonicandtoxin
https://www.teatonicandtoxin.com
Stay mysterious...
The League of Frightened Men by Rex Stout - with Ira Brad Matetsky!
Edgar Award winning Bearskin with author James A McLaughlin
Norman Shabel's Legal Thrillers
The Hollow Man by John Dickson Carr
Carter Wilson chats about his newest thriller: The Father She Went to Find
The Postman Always Rings Twice - with guest Rebecca Heisler!
Barbara Nickless tells us about Play of Shadows
The Thin Man, part 2.
The Thin Man, part 1!
2023 Retrospective!
The Nine Tailors, part 2!
Looking Ahead to 2024
The Nine Tailors, part 1!
Murder on the Orient Express, part 2
Murder on the Orient Express, part 1
Recipes for Murder, part 2: All about Agatha
Recipes for Murder, part 1!
The Case of the Velvet Claws
Rumor of Evil- a chat with Gary Braver
Malice Aforethought, episode 2!
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Lit Society: Books and Drama
Ex Libris
Write The Book: Conversations on Craft
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
Black Beauty
Fresh Air
Myths and Legends