Lady Sherlock series by Sherry Thomas and the issue of "Maximum Tolerable Chins" :D

koalathebear

I have totally and utterly fallen in love with the Lady Sherlock series by Sherry Thomas (https://www.goodreads.com/series/176858-lady-sherlock). It's utterly enchanting. There are four in the series thusfar, being "A Study in Scarlet Women", "A Conspiracy in Belgravia", "The Hollow of Fear" and "The Art of Theft," the last of which was released this month. You can buy them on amazon here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/bookseries/B01N5R9HMM/ref=dp_st_0425281426



I've read and listened to all four books and adore them. I thought I had grown weary of reboots of the Sherlock Holmes story, but this one is very fresh and delightful.

Blurb: USA Today bestselling author Sherry Thomas turns the story of the renowned Sherlock Holmes upside down in the first novel in this Victorian mystery series….

With her inquisitive mind, Charlotte Holmes has never felt comfortable with the demureness expected of the fairer sex in upper class society. But even she never thought that she would become a social pariah, an outcast fending for herself on the mean streets of London.

When the city is struck by a trio of unexpected deaths and suspicion falls on her sister and her father, Charlotte is desperate to find the true culprits and clear the family name. She’ll have help from friends new and old—a kind-hearted widow, a police inspector, and a man who has long loved her.

But in the end, it will be up to Charlotte, under the assumed name Sherlock Holmes, to challenge society’s expectations and match wits against an unseen mastermind.

*

One very small, prosaic point that I particularly love is the fact that notwithstanding her almost supernatural brilliance, Charlotte is constantly battling against her love of food - which wars with her desire to fend off the approach of weight gain which she describes as maintaining Maximum Tolerable Chins Some quotes below.

From A Study in Scarlet Women

“Please don’t think that my circumstances stand between me and a full stomach.” At least not until lately. “It has been all for vanity, of course. I can sustain somewhere between one point five and one point six chins. But the moment I have more than that, my looks suffer catastrophically.”

Mrs. Jebediah laughed, startled. “But surely you exaggerate, my dear.”

“I assure you I do not. Via scientific trials, I have determined the precise weight, to the ounce, at which the shape of my face changes to my detriment.”

*

“Mrs. Watson feeds me ’round the clock and I haven’t turned anything down. But at the rate I’m going, within the week I’ll reach Maximum Tolerable Chins. Then I’ll be obliged to give up this reckless dining.”

*

Charlotte looked longingly at the rest of the cake on the plate. Alas, she was already at one-point-four chins and must refrain from a second slice.

From A Conspiracy in Belgravia

She glanced down at the muffin, as if debating whether to drench it with even more butter. The term Maximum Tolerable Chins popped into Mrs. Watson’s head—it had come up the first time they sat down at the table together, the benchmark for whether Miss Holmes ate as she wished or gave in to the lamentable necessity to curb her appetite.

With visible regret Miss Holmes set down her butter knife.

*

Of course. Now she saw the error of her ways. She had been so consumed by the Vigenère cipher that she—horrors—hadn’t been eating properly. A quick glance at the mirror told her that she was down to only one point three chins. No wonder her brain was so slow and unwieldy, like a steam engine on the last shovel of coal.

Two more madeleines and she felt like a new woman.

*

Moreover, he was the sort of fortunate man who could eat what he pleased without having to worry about exceeding Maximum Tolerable Chins. In fact, Charlotte suspected that the more he ate, the leaner he became.

*

“Oh, my.” Charlotte was already huffing and puffing after a quarter of an hour. “I don’t know that I can keep up for much longer.”

“Come, Miss Holmes. Think of it as staving off the arrival of Maximum Tolerable Chins. After you exercise, you can indulge your appetite more freely.”

Charlotte panted. “Well, in that case, I might find some additional willpower.”


*

Charlotte sat before her vanity, pinning up her hair and counting her chins.

From The Hollow of Fear

Miss Holmes eyed a third slice of Madeira cake, but did not reach for it—possibly because she was approaching Maximum Tolerable Chins, the point at which she began regulating further helpings of cakes and puddings.

*

With her Sherrinford beard on, it was difficult to gauge how close—or far away—she was from Maximum Tolerable Chins, the hypothetical limit at which Miss Holmes began to watch how much she ate. But Mrs. Watson very much suspected that her appetite had not recovered. She didn’t look very different, but she felt slighter—and very, very weary.

*

Inside the house she took off both her hat and her wig—a woman’s wig, this time—and sat down in front of the vanity table to massage her scalp. In the mirror she seemed thinner. Was she already down to only one point two chins?

Another face appeared in the mirror. “Counting your chins?”

“Me? How dare you accuse me of such rampant self-absorption!”


*

From The Art of Theft

Charlotte exhaled—and wished that she had Bernadine’s distaste for cake. Not always, of course, but for brief and intense spells that made it easier to give up extra servings in times of impending Maximum Tolerable Chins.

Charlotte preferred to indulge herself perennially. Alas, her love of cake and other sweet confections sometimes conflicted with her vanity: at around 1.5 chins the shape of her face changed. But Maximum Tolerable Chins wasn’t merely a matter of features; it was also the point at which her garments became restricting. And beyond that, uncomfortably tight.

She had a great many uses for her money and didn’t have room in her budget for outgrowing her entire wardrobe.


*

“I hope you may still take one or two of these mignardises.”

Miss Charlotte considered the matter: The approach of Maximum Tolerable Chins was, in this household at least, treated with all the gravity of an outbreak of war. “I suppose, if I eliminate all puddings from my other meals, I may take one of these a day at tea.”

Mrs. Watson exhaled, resting her palm against her heart.

“And perhaps we can resume our canne de combat practice. We might yet stave off Maximum Tolerable Chins, if you put me through my paces, ma’am.”

Mrs. Watson chortled. Miss Charlotte was not otherwise the most eager participant in vigorous activities. Maximum Tolerable Chins might be doing her a favor, forcing her to exercise more.

*

“I’ve never seen you take so little butter,” he said.

“I shouldn’t have any butter at all. But it is high misery indeed, to be battling Maximum Tolerable Chins in France, of all places. A little butter eases the suffering.”

*

“I miss hot cocoa with a burning passion,” Charlotte sighed. “Every time I approach Maximum Tolerable Chins, I make solemn resolutions to be more moderate in my cake intake. And then a year passes and I’m at Maximum Tolerable Chins again.”

*

When she looked back at Charlotte, she said, “I think your austerity measures are working. You’re visibly farther from Maximum Tolerable Chins than you were a few days ago.”

Charlotte patted herself under her jaw. “I will not bore you with tales of hardship, but it has been dreadful. The things I do in service to my vanity.”

Perhaps he should have brought her something. Flowers. Or cake, if she had managed to reverse Maximum Tolerable Chins.



She helps to deal with Maximum Tolerable Chins with an interesting form of cardio. Canne de combat a French martial art which uses a canne or cane (a kind of walking-stick) as the weapon. It's quite athletic.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amim06DsIpY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPk-K7L7H2s

The only downside was that after reading the last novel, I went out to my favourite pâtisserie to buy some éclair and salted caramel religieuse and had a ridiculous craving for French madeleines ... which then necessitated some extra cardio to compensate...

M0n1KCR

Thanks for the recommendation, they look interesting

tcunbeliever

I'm not even sure which sounds more amazing, the books or cane fighting!

koalathebear

I'd never heard of canne de combat before these novels - it looks amazingly athletic.

JetJaguar

In the original stories, Sherlock Holmes was an expert at something called bartitsu, which combined stick fighting with Japanese martial arts (he was also an excellent boxer). Bartitsu was invented to be a "gentlemanly" method of self-defense. Canne de combat looks like a version of this.

These books sound interesting, I'll have to check them out!