You would struggle to find someone who’s unfamiliar with Sherlock Holmes, but are there many people who think like him? You’ll certainly find many who have dressed up as him, some of them using costume props made available for photo opportunities at the Sherlock Holmes museum. But looking like and thinking like are very different things.

Holmes was famous for his logical thinking and unrivaled level of observation—traits that made him a better detective than his peers. Mastermind: How to Think Like Sherlock Holmes examines the tools and techniques employed by Holmes, with the aim of taking them from the pages of fiction to the reality of life. The book, written by journalist and author Maria Konnikova, who holds a PhD in psychology and is a PokerStars ambassador, aims to help the reader improve his or her habitual thought process by asking a single question: “What would Sherlock Holmes do?” Konnikova employs a unique approach in this self-help book, taking the modern disciplines of psychology and neuroscience and applying them to the character traits of the “Consulting Detective.” The aim of the book is to increase the reader’s creativity, problem-solving skills, and perception abilities.

Critics could quite easily argue that Holmes was a fictional character and therefore it’s not really possible to credit a work of fiction with truly extraordinary mental ability. But this misses the premise of the book, which is that Holmes is more of a medium through which its message is transmitted. The book argues that there are two contrasting mental systems, not unlike the premise of the book Thinking, Fast and Slow. In order to demonstrate these systems, Konnikova uses Sherlock Holmes and his sidekick, Dr. Watson. According to her, we mostly exhibit the traits of Watson, while we should instead try to be more like Holmes. Watson doesn’t fare too well in the book; he is usually used as an example of what not to do or how not to think. Examples of this include suppressing creativity and letting first impressions influence your thinking. However, this portrayal of Watson is perhaps a little unfair, since the Holmes/Watson contrast is merely a way for Konnikova to demonstrate her ideas on the right and wrong ways of thinking. After all, Dr. Watson must have been reasonably intelligent—he is a doctor!

There is likely a direct correlation between how much one loves Sherlock Holmes and how much one will dislike the application of the theory to the fictional characters. Nonetheless, the majority of the theories and concepts are solid, covering self-awareness, meditation, and cognitive biases. Holmes’ “memory attic” concept is less robust. Based on 19th-century concepts of memory, which viewed memory function as similar to a computer hard drive, it overlooks more modern understandings of memory, which sees it as an active process, requiring recall in order to boost memory power.

As a tool for understanding complex topics in layperson’s terms, the format of Mastermind is successful. But it may not be suitable for those with more experience in this field or die-hard fans of Sherlock Holmes.

Buy Mastermind (Penguin Books, 2013) here.









Author Details Daniel Bradshaw Contributor Daniel Bradshaw is a writer and film journalist from Newcastle, England, where he lives with his wife and kids. Cinema is his religion.