Arthur Conan Doyle had killed off Sherlock Holmes at Reichenbach Falls in 1893, but reader demand proved unstoppable. Set before that fictional death, this atmospheric tale of a spectral hound haunting the Baskerville family on the Devon moors became one of the most beloved detective novels ever written, paving the way for Holmes's full literary resurrection two years later.
Doyle had grown weary of Holmes, feeling the detective stories distracted from what he considered his more serious historical fiction. He'd killed Holmes off in 'The Final Problem,' sending him plunging over Reichenbach Falls locked in combat with Professor Moriarty, and public mourning was so intense that some readers reportedly wore black armbands.
Eight years later, financial incentive and a fantastic plot idea—inspired by Devon folklore about a phantom hound and conversations with journalist Bertram Fletcher Robinson—brought Doyle back to his most famous creation, though he cannily set the story before Holmes's death, sidestepping the resurrection question for the moment. The tale of Sir Charles Baskerville's mysterious death on the fog-shrouded moor, and the legend of a diabolical hound stalking his family line, unfolded across nine monthly installments in The Strand.
The novel's brooding atmosphere, its vast, forbidding moorland setting, and Holmes's characteristically brilliant unraveling of a seemingly supernatural mystery made it an instant sensation. Its success all but guaranteed Holmes's full return in 1903's 'The Adventure of the Empty House,' where Doyle finally, grudgingly, explained how his detective survived the fall.