Annoying, My Dear Watson

For the past couple of years, I have had a book that is meant to be read a page at a time.  I read Monarchs, Murderers, and Mistresses:  A Royal Book of Days, and A Reader's Book of Days with the calendar years.  I really enjoyed having a book to read throughout the year, a page or so at a time.

I did not find a book-of-days style book for this year, but I did find a "read a book in a year" page-a-day calendar.  I had a choice of Jane Austen's Pride & Prejudice or Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's The Hound of the Baskervilles.  I had never read The Hound of the Baskervilles, and Austen is not really my cup of tea, so it was an easy choice.

I'm only seven days into the calendar/book and already Holmes is driving me batty!  I admit, two years ago was the first time I had read any of Sherlock Holmes stories/novels.  I read a combined edition of both A Study in Scarlet and The Sign of the Four as the last book of the year for 2013.  Before that, my only real exposure to Sherlock Holmes had been through the Jeremy Brett portrayal in the series that was aired as part of Mystery! on PBS.  I had never really read anything of the famous sleuth.  A Study in Scarlet was short enough that the character did not get on my nerves too much, and it was the first introduction to the character, so the quirks of the character had not been fully fleshed out.  I found The Sign of the Four spent far more time discussing the Mormons and Mormonism than character development, so my experience with Holmes as a character has been limited.

But in just the eight days I've read, which is about half of Chapter 1 of The Hound of the Baskervilles, I'm ready to slap Holmes into next week!  Does he get any less pompous?  Is there ever a moment when he does not know more than everyone else?  Is there a ever a moment when the character is even a tiny bit humble?

I will finish the the book, but I think reading it a bit at a time is the best way to get through the book for me.  If I had to sit down and visit with Holmes for more than five or ten minutes at a time I think I'd be ripping the book to shreds.  I'm already screaming back at the text.  I really do not understand how he has survived as a favorite character.