Book excerpt: Sealed away from public view more than a century at the instruction of their author, Dr John Watson, these three cases of Sherlock Holmes are available here for the first time. Like the earlier volume in this series, each reveals the role Holmes and Watson played in investigating crimes involving actual historical events and prominent personages. "A Grotesquery in Limehouse" explores Holmes' involvement in solving the mutilation and murder of a Belgian businessman near the London docks, a crime that is linked to the despicable role of King Leopold II in brutally exploiting the people and resources of the Belgian Congo. "The Disappearances at the Flannan Light" recounts Holmes' role in solving a century and a quarter long mystery concerning what befell the three keeps who vanished without a trace from the remote Scottish Flannan Lighthouse on the cusp of the twentieth century. "The Case of the Shattered Propeller" plunges Holmes and Watson into the inquiry into the disastrous crash of the Wright Flyer during its military trial flight in Fort Myer, Virginia in 1908, revealing long-concealed aspects of this tragic moment in aviation history. These stories have been prepared for public release by John Lawrence, who has edited numerous historic Holmes adventures in the volumes of the MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Adventures as well as the novel, Sherlock Holmes and the Affair at Mayerling Lodge. He worked for 38 years in the U.S. House of Representatives and is a history Ph.D. and professor living in Washington DC and Santa Fe, New Mexico. His non-fiction works include Arc of Power: Inside the Speakership of Nancy Pelosi, and Class of '74: Congress After Watergate and the Roots of Partisanship.