I love the depiction of Professor Challenger. I think we all know people like that.

Held my interest, but there seemed to be a lot of anti-Semitism in the descriptions of the inventor.

There's nothing really profound here for a modern sci-fi reader but it does pack in a lot for such a short story - a machine that can disintegrate anything, the imagined horror of what such a machine could be used for if in the wrong hands, and the death of one man to save millions. All themes and ideas that have been explored in more detail in other works, but for such a quick read, it was worth the time.

Humorous short story about a man who created a machine that can disintegrate almost anything. Nice ending. Could only find one quote due to the shortness of the book.

"You cannot explain one incredible thing by quoting another incredible thing"

Interesting book. The Professor Challenger character is not endearing as Sherlock Holmes is, but the story was interesting.

Read the ePub from feedbooks: http://www.feedbooks.com/book/354

The final appearance of Professor Challenger fizzles in an awkward, rushed story written near the end of Doyle's life when he was consumed with the supernatural. In the story, Challenger and Malone encounter a mad scientist who has created a machine that disintegrates matter, causing invisibility and even the rearrangement of matter, and has sold the machine to a devious foreign nation. This story is nothing more than Doyle's attempt to sketch out the possibility that such a machine could exist.

In the same year, he published [b:The Edge of the Unknown|1426034|The Edge of the Unknown|Arthur Conan Doyle|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1266799271s/1426034.jpg|1416495] (which I also happen to be reading now), in which he makes the ludicrous claim that his friend Houdini may have had the very same power -- to transport his body through solid matter and across space -- even though Houdini kept telling Doyle that it was all illusion and trickery. Doyle also claims that such a thing may be possible because what we call solid mass might be like a projection on the screen of the "ether." (I'll be writing a full review of that loony book as soon as I finish it.) Since this story was published the same year as The Edge of the Unknown, it seems that Doyle was just trotting out Challenger one more time to explore this fringe belief. It was an odd end for one of the oddest characters in fiction.

The conclusion, which I won't spoil, is comic and absurd. I'm sure that was Doyle's intension, even though it ultimately ends up being at Doyle's own expense. I enjoyed the story, despite (or maybe because) of how bad it was.

A very short short story, but I rather liked it, especially the ending (3,5 stars)

From BBC Radio 4 Extra:
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's indomitable academic must investigate dastardly Latvian scientist Theodore Nemor. Stars Bill Paterson.