Colin Pendragon Mystery Books In Order

Publication Order of Colin Pendragon Mystery Books

Colin Pendragon Mystery is a series of historical mystery novels written by Gregory Harris. The books follow the exploits of a team of private investigators that solve crimes in Victorian London.

+The Story

Sherlock Holmes is considered by many to be the greatest literary detective of all time. He’s certainly the most famous of the lot, and there have been various attempts to recreate him over the decades.

Some authors have simply transposed Sherlock and his stories into new eras and time periods. Other authors have crafted stories featuring new detectives that are reminiscent of the popular Arthur Conan Doyle character.

There are authors whose attempts at producing original historical mysteries set in Victorian England have seen them criticized for their perceived blatant attempts at recreating the Sherlock Holmes mythos. This is despite their claims that the similarities between their stories and Arthur Conan Doyle’s work are coincidental.

Sufficing to say, it is difficult to create an intelligent detective who uses extraordinarily deductive skills to solve mysteries without eliciting comparisons with Sherlock Holmes. That might explain why Gregory Harris seems to embrace the Sherlock Holmes comparisons.

The Colin Pendragon books are as close an homage to Sherlock Holmes as one can get. The books are historical mysteries set in Victorian London. They follow the exploits of Colin Pendragon, a brilliant and handsome detective who uses his sharp intellect to solve mysteries. Colin comes from privilege.

His father is a high-ranking government official and he has generally enjoyed all the comforts that Victorian England has to offer for most of his life.

If the fact that Colin Pendragon comes from a wealthy background isn’t enough, the detective also lives in a house run by a cranky woman who isn’t exactly Mrs. Hudson but she might as well be.

Colin lives with Ethan Pruitt, his constant and loyal companion who accompanies him on all his adventures and helps him put the pieces of different puzzles together. Ethan definitely plays the role of Watson in the Colin Pendragon Mystery series.

Though, unlike Watson, Ethan comes from a pretty well-off family. And unlikely Watson, rather than enrolling in the army, Ethan got hooked on opium as a child. His drug habit pretty much ruined his life, and he would have remained in the gutters of life if Colin hadn’t met and rescued him.

Since then, Ethan has remained loyal to Colin, doing what he can to assist and protect him when he stumbles into dangerous waters.

The one aspect of the Colin Pendragon Mystery series that most drastically differs from the Sherlock Holmes mythos is the fact that Ethan is Colin’s lover. It has been suggested by some readers that the Colin Pendragon series is the result of the myriad fanfiction stories online that see Sherlock and Watson engaging in a homosexual relationship.

Colin’s relationship with Ethan is an important aspect of this series. Because of the prejudices of the times, Colin and Ethan are unable to advertise their relationship.

Colin and Ethan are written with differing personalities. Ethan is often consumed by angst over his past mistakes. He worries that he will fall back into his addiction. He does what he can to keep Colin’s arrogance in check and to help him politely interface with the victims and suspects of crimes.

Colin Pendragon is typical of most extraordinarily intelligent detectives in fiction. He thinks he’s better than most of the people he meets. It doesn’t help that he is so much smarter than them and that everyone woman fawns over him because he is so handsome.

The fact that he is so unlikable works against Colin’s efforts to solve mysteries because his attitude tends to alienate the people he needs to help him solve his cases. Colin is often so unlikeable that it makes little sense why Ethan stays with him.

Gregory Harris initially keeps the details of Colin’s relationship with Ethan a secret when this series starts. As the series progresses, he begins revealing tidbits of information that finally flesh out the Colin/Ethan situation, delving into both of their backstories and how they ended up in their current situations.

The Colin Pendragon series has been commended for breathing some fresh energy into an old trope. Rather than trying something new, Gregory Harris adds a few twists to the same old thing.

+The Author

Gregory Harris wrote the Colin Pendragon series. Gregory has always wanted to tell stories. Born and raised outside of Chicago, Gregory spent many of his earliest years immersed in his own imagination.

He was encouraged by his sister and cousin, both great storytellers, to embrace his creative side, though back then Gregory didn’t know that his creative talents would lead him into literary fiction.

A student of the University of Southern California, Gregory initially worked in television and film. He got to participate in the making of a number of movies and television series.

After two decades in the entertainment business, Gregory left to experiment with the financial services industry before finally giving fiction writing a try.

Gregory Harris has written both fiction and nonfiction.

+The Arnifour Affair

The Arnifour family has a mystery that needs solving. Lady Arnifour’s husband has passed on, having been beaten to death. Elsbeth, her niece, was left in a coma as a result of the same incident.

And now Colin Pendragon must try and find the perpetrator. But determining the motive proves to be quite the challenge. The police have their sights set on the groundskeeper and his son but Colin isn’t so convinced.

To solve the mystery, he enlists the help of his partner Ethan Pruitt as they unravel the secrets of the Arnifour family. Meanwhile, a missing person’s case has Ethan worried. To find the lost sister of a young street urchin, they must investigate the opium dens of London, a journey that Ethan is afraid to undertake because of his past addiction.

+The Bellingham Bloodbath

The captain of Her Majesty’s Guard is dead. Someone murdered him in his flat and they didn’t spare his young wife.

When Colin Pendragon is summoned to Buckingham Palace along with his partner Ethan Pruitt, it is made clear to him that he must solve the murder while applying the utmost discretion.

The reputation of the Guard must be protected at all costs. There are calls to initiate a cover-up by lying to the press, and Colin is ready to play along, but only if he is first given three days to try and solve the case.

One Response to “Colin Pendragon Mystery”

1. Garry Kugler: 3 years ago

   Read all 6 books, but I started with the last one first and then went back and read all 6 in order….enjoyed them even more!
   What will happen now that Colin and Ethan have taken on Paul’s education and what becomes of Charlotte Hutton? Does Mrs B get her dumbwaiter? All these questions will have to wait for future books and I’m sure that writing a book is a very laborious and difficult undertaking, but you do it so well!
   Look forward to hearing from you,
   Garry

   Reply