Pursuit of the House-Boat

What happens when Sherlock Holmes meets the ghost of Sherlock Holmes? John Kendrick Bangs' gleeful sequel to A House-Boat on the Styx assembles an impossible congregation in the underworld: the great detective (as narrated by Watson), the great detective (as narrated by himself), Edgar Allan Poe, Shakespeare, and dozens of other luminaries who happen to be dead. When pirates kidnap the ladies of Hades and abscond with their house-boat, this spectral society must mount a rescue. Holmes applies his methods to the hereafter, Poe supplies appropriate gloom, and the whole affair becomes a literary parlor game of the highest order. Bangs treats death not as an ending but as an excuse for witty debate, romantic mishap, and thoroughly improper adventures. The result is Victorian whimsy at its finest: a caper that knows exactly how absurd it is and leans into every delightful moment.