A new addition to the Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes series
from science fiction and crime author Eric Brown.
A second wave of Martians has come to Earth - the first wave having
succumbed to lethal Terran pathogens. The second wave, arriving some
five years later, did so with the aid of a cure for the various ills
that scuppered their earlier plans - and these Martians claim to have
come in peace.
Humankind, lulled into a false sense of security, welcomes the Martians
who bring with them a host of technological and scientific wonders, and
for several years an entente exists between the two races. It is only
when Holmes and Watson travel to the Red Planet, ostensibly to track
down the killer of an eminent Martian philosopher, that they learn the
truth: the Martians who invaded Earth are tyrannical despots who
subjugated a 'lesser' race of their own kind, and are merely biding
their time to enslave the citizens of Earth. With the assistance of
anti-Martian activist Miss Freya Hadfield-Bell, and a cadre of renegade
Martians, Holmes and Watson escape Mars with their lives and return to
Earth where they hope to work to overcome the rule of the oppressive
Martian overlords.