The similarities and the differences between the two detective stories The Speckled Band written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Forever After written by Jim Thomson.

In the speckled band was written in the normal way of writing detective stories. There is a detective, a shady, typical villain, a spooky house, a suspect, many red herrings and a very difficult mystery to solve. The surprise in the story is when the mystery has been solved. Holmes already has a reputation before you even pick up the book. This gives Conan Doyle the advantage of not having to create a character.

Dr Watson starts off the book by talking about all of the seventy odd mysteries he has witnessed his friend Sherlock Holmes investigate and solve. The he singles out one story in particular that he remembers this is the story of the speckled band. This makes you think that this story is special and is different from all of his other stories if this is the story, which he remembers in particularly.

The story begins and a strange woman has arrived one early morning at Sherlock Holmes's house. The author describes her as a lady heavily veiled and dressed in black. This told me that she is possibly mourning someone's death; this creates a very dark and scary atmosphere, it also makes the reader very curious. This early arrival also makes the reader wonder what story this woman has arrived to tell and her appearance gives the impression that it could be a dark and frightening tale.

Henry Brunskill, Page 2, 02/10/01

The opening in Forever After is extremely different. It got me interested by the quote they embraced passionately, her body pressed against the meat cleaver concealed in his shirt and shivered in delicious anticipation. This to me immediately gives me an interest to read on. The words passionately and meat cleaver really grab the reader's attention. The sentence follows with Very soon this will be over, that stupid ox of a husband would be dead. This is a very intense and powerful quotation. This makes the reader extremely curious, the speckled band also made the reader curious.

The Speckled Band is set in Stoke Moran, which is on the Western border of Surrey in Helen Stoner's Estate. The description of the house also adds to the atmosphere The house was of grey, lichen blotched stone with a high central portion and two curving wings like claws of a crab, thrown out on each side. This reminded me of the Stereotypical haunted house that occur in most other murder mysteries. This house in particular is extremely spooky which adds to the effect, the sharp claws represent danger.

Forever After is set mostly in Ardis Clinton's house, which leaves the traditional haunted house and represents the change of the times. Another thing both of the stories have in common is that they both have complicated and well planned ways of murdering the victim.

As we all know all murder mysteries must have a villain. In Forever After the villain is Ardis Clinton, she is portrayed as a fairly seductive and devious character. There is not much description of Ardis Clinton's physical features but from the book. I got the impression that she was very attractive and uses her looks to get her own way with her husband and her lover Tony. Her motives are that she has been stuck with her husband who she despises and hates in every way.

It is clear from the start of the story that Ardis is planning to get her husband murdered, even though I wouldn't doubt her killing her husband, she still gets her lover Tony to do it. In my opinion this shows she is cunning and sly. She doesn't want to kill him herself.

Another thing that you can easily tell that Forever After was written more recently than The Speckled Band is that the villain is a woman. In the 1890's, the criminal in a book would never have been female. Everyone was a lot more sexist compared to more recent times, when women have all of the same rites as men. Dr Roylett is the villain in The Speckled Band. He is the stereotypical villain who is big and scary and strange and everyone is terrified of him. Compared to Forever After this villain is boring and predictable.

Henry Brunskill, Page 3, 02/10/01

The detectives in the two stories play a very different role. Sherlock Holmes is the main character and he is inn all of the scenes in the play where as Lieutenant Powers only is in a few scenes at the end. The whole of "the speckled band" is Holmes prying around finding out clues and information where as Powers only arrives at the end of the story and solves the case by tricking Ardis with brute force and underhanded means, whereas Holmes uses his wits

Holmes is an old fashioned detective but he is probably the most famous detective of all times. He has acquired this reputation by solving many exceptionally difficult cases, where as Lieutenant Powers seems to be a regular detective who has been trained in many techniques to solve the case.

In my opinion the two stories both have many similarities and many differences. This is because that they are two completely different styles of writing detective

Stories. The Speckled Band is the traditional style and Forever After is the American Hard boiled style. This is where nearly all the differences become noticed. Also the fact Forever After was written 70 years after The Speckled Band also creates lots of differences. They are also written in different tenses. The Speckled Band is being told as a story whereas Forever After is happening as it is told.