A Study in Sable

The eleventh novel in the Elemental Masters series, featuring a reimagined Sherlock Holmes in a magical early 20th-century London.

Sarah and Nan (from Wizard of London and Home From The Sea), who are Psychics rather than Elemental Masters, are sent on a most peculiar interview by their patron, Lord Alderscroft. When they arrive at the highly eccentric bachelor’s flat, he asks them all manner of questions about their bona-fides and experience in a most offensive manner. Tiring of answering politely, Nan turns the tables on him and gets just as rude and offensive — and so do the birds! Eventually, the man gives up, saying, “Well at least there is some scientific evidence for psychical powers, unlike your mumbo-jumbo, John. They’re all yours.”

And so they work with a physician, Dr. John Watson, and his wife Mary, both Elemental Masters. Sarah and Nan are to help with investigations that the famous “consulting detective” cannot (or will not) take himself, because they are tainted with “mumbo-jumbo.”