Letters from Watson

Regular emails from your friend Dr John Watson about the adventures of his eccentric detective roommate.

Inspired by Mark Kirkland’s excellent Dracula Daily, Letters from Watson was my digital book club allowing participants to read through the entirety of the Sherlock Holmes stories by Arthur Conan Doyle. Around 12,000 people signed up to read the short stories in 2023, and the novels in 2024!

I’ve been thrilled to see how these emails become a nucleus for so much creativity and fun. There have been mountains of discussion, annotations and analysis, there has been fanart, fanfic and craft projects, there have been watch parties, table top roleplaying games and at least one actual real-life picnic. It’s been amazing to think that these century-old stories which I fell in love with in a solitary way as a dorky teenager can bind a bunch of people together from across the globe!