Spiral Mind Trilogy

Everyone is a character in somebody's story, but not everyone finds out they are. Things get complicated when Sherlock Holmes can't prove he's real. We thought we lived in 21st-century London, but when everything around us turned into that Victorian cesspool on the pages of the Strand Magazine, it was clear the evil genius was not Moriarty. It was a doctor with a silly moustache. There are two solutions to the mystery of finding yourself in a story from over a hundred years ago. Solution 1: you have been fooled by a clever fake. That would not happen to Sherlock Holmes, who has for once himself consulted experts on the matter without revealing his own identity to them. Solution 2: the stories are genuine and it turns out you are just a fictional character who finds himself in the wrong time period. By mistake, by adaptation, by magic? All impossible gobbledygook, in Watson's opinion-did I say, Watson? I meant John. Of course, we're in the 21st century, after all. Or are we? Sherlock and John are not so sure when suddenly, “A Case of Identity” happens in front of them, including the ridiculous Victorian clothes described in it. The only person at 221B who can't find themselves in the stories is amnesiac Scarlett Vendalle, whose forgotten criminal past and love for John resurface as she finds out why she is seeing visions of Anne Boleyn...

There was only ever going to be one place this would end. There, deep down in that dreadful cauldron of swirling water and seething foam. You will have read these words before, even if you don't recognise them. Reichenbach is not a place, it's a fall. We should have recognised the Scottish writer with the silly moustache. *** The paths of Sherlock Holmes and James Moriarty don't cross often. After all, the Crime of the Century doesn't commit itself. And it wouldn't be the Crime of the Century if it wasn't stealing the Crown Jewels. Sherlock knows this, of course, but then uncommitted crimes don't need solving. John and Scarlett are desperate. After finding their cases written down in the Strand Magazine from over a hundred years ago, Sherlock hasn't been able to change the course of a single one. Everything is happening exactly as it is written down, and Sherlock seems to follow the path laid out for him willingly. It is up to the two people closest to him to stop him. With Scarlett arrested for the theft of a Crown Jewel and John finding himself possessed by a Scottish voice telling him to kill Sherlock Holmes, it becomes evident that there is another presence besides Moriarty who wants to bring their adventures to a conclusion. Can they get to the centre of Moriarty's web before they are fully turned into fiction? And what is Mrs Hudson doing spinning threads in the corner?