A Study in Charlotte

Brittany Cavallaro, New York Times bestselling author of the young adult Charlotte Holmes Mysteries series, holds a PhD in literature and teaches creative writing, as well as continuing to write fiction and poetry. A Study in Charlotte (2016) is the first title in the series. Subsequent titles (as of 2023) are The Last of August (2017), The Case for Jamie (2018), and A Question of Holmes (2019). A Study in Charlotte is categorized as in the genres Teen and Young Adult Detective Stories and Teen and Young Adult Law & Crime Fiction, and the novel contains minor elements of the romance genre.

This study guide and all its page citations are based on the Kindle edition of the novel.

Content Warning: This novel refers to incidents of rape and frequent drug use.

Plot Summary

The novel is set at the fictional Sherringford Academy, a US Ivy League prep school in Connecticut. Events span the months of October through December in an unspecified contemporary year. The story uses first-person narration from the viewpoint of 16-year-old James Watson, though the Epilogue departs from this format, switching to 16-year-old Charlotte Holmes’s perspective. The descendants of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, Charlotte and James must solve a multiple crimes based on several Sherlock Holmes stories and clear their own names as the perpetrators. As the two amateur detectives race to solve these crimes on their school campus, the novel examines the themes of Mind and Heart, Family Legacies, and Fiction Versus Reality.

The novel starts from the premise that Sherlock Holmes was a real detective, Dr. John Watson documented Holmes’s investigative work, and Arthur Conan Doyle was simply Watson’s literary agent. Additionally, descendants of Holmes and Watson have continued to associate with each other through subsequent generations. The Holmes family is known for producing brilliant eccentrics who regularly assist Scotland Yard. The Watsons are less well-known but function in a support capacity to the Holmeses and maintain written records of the family’s exploits. Additionally, the descendants of archvillain Professor Moriarty have continued to conduct nefarious operations on multiple continents. Although not all the members of the Moriarty family are criminals, many still are. They maintain a facade of respectability to cover their underworld activities.

Dr. Watson’s young descendant, James, has been sent to Sherringford Academy. His parents have divorced, and James avoids contact with his father, who lives nearby and has started a new family. Shortly after arriving at the academy, James learns that Charlotte Holmes, the young descendant of Sherlock Holmes, is also enrolled at the school. Eager to meet his counterpart, James fantasizes about helping her solve crimes. When they meet, Charlotte is less enthusiastic about a partnership. A brilliant loner, she runs illegal poker games in her dorm basement and keeps a private lab in the science building.

Fate throws James and Charlotte together when a school jock named Dobson is murdered. Crime scene clues match those in the Sherlock Holmes story “The Adventure of the Speckled Band.” Dobson raped Charlotte while she was under the influence of oxycodone, and James later beat him up for bragging about it, so they’re implicated in his murder and thus join forces to clear their names. An attack on another student follows that also implicates them, forcing them to find the culprit before they’re arrested for the crimes.

In the process, they recognize their relative strengths and weaknesses as a team. Charlotte has been trained to use her mind and suppress emotions, while James cultivates his imagination and feelings. Her drug use, however, impacts their investigation. While under the influence of oxycodone, she confesses that she fell in love with her tutor, August Moriarty. When he didn’t return her feelings, Charlotte staged a drug drop that got August and his brother Lucien arrested. August then faked death by suicide to disappear. The Moriarty family has held a grudge against Charlotte ever since, giving them a motive for revenge.

The amateur sleuths eventually identify the killer as August’s ex-fiancée, Bryony, who claims that Charlotte ruined her life and is working with Lucien to bring Charlotte down. When James is poisoned by a deadly toxin, Charlotte is told that she must confess to the campus crimes to save his life. With her brother Milo’s help, Charlotte foils the scheme and captures Bryony. However, Lucien says the real objective was to find out what Charlotte cares about. This proves to be James since she’d do anything to save his life. Lucien warns that he’ll use this information at some point in the future. The novel ends as James and Charlotte return to England for Christmas break, during which Charlotte hopes to find a new case for the Holmes-Watson team to crack.