Sherlock Holmes pastiches old man,' solving the case of the missing parrot belonging to a nine-year-old Jewish refugee boy from Germany. While readily solving the mystery, 'the old man,' as well as the rest of the characters in the novella, fail to see what the parrot's incessant muttering of random German numbers really means. Caleb Carr was approached to pen a tale for the anthology "Ghosts of Baker Street". Carr's short story grew to become a full length novel which became 2005's "The Italian Secretary". An example of Sherlock Holmes pastiche is found in "The Curse of the Nibelung: A Sherlock Holmes Mystery"
Gerry Rafferty consummate songwriter, blessed with sensitivity and an enviable melodic flair that at its best recalled Paul McCartney." Other entertainers also paid tribute to Rafferty, with comedian and ex-bandmate Billy Connolly calling him "a hugely talented songwriter and singer who will be greatly missed" and musician Tom Robinson saying, "His early work with Stealers Wheel was an inspiration to a whole generation of songwriters in the 70s, including me." Speaking after the funeral, Charlie Reid of The Proclaimers said: "I think Gerry Rafferty was one of the few people who really successfully straddled the worlds of both folk and popular music.