Hmmm. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Hmmmmmmmmm. Oh what’s wrong? Well, I will tell you. When I was in grad school I was taking a class called “The Inklings: Anti-Modernism” and I really liked it. One of the books we read was Dorothy Sayers’s Gaudy Night and it was fantastic. And I’ve been chasing that dragon ever since. I keep giving her earlier books a try, and I keep finding them lacking.
So the case with this one is a problem across a few fields: one, I don’t like the audiobook reader here. He’s a well-known actor who played Lord Peter int he 1970s, and while I am sure he’s a good actor, his reading of this book is kind of mushmouthed and hard to follow. Two, it’s still early in the series, and Sayers is already cannibalizing Lord Peter Wimsey’s family for cases. I almost always find these to be the most trying because while the stakes are high, they’re so much more improbable. So I wish she had laid off. Also, and this is the last point, I am just not convinced I liked Wimsey much yet. I was already spoiled by having his charming assistant Harriet Vane be the hero of Gaudy Night, but here, she’s not even part of the series yet! So it feels like I am waiting for the parts I liked to show up and sorting through the rest. I should skip ahead, but knowing me I will either barrel forth or not read these for a while. It’s not Sayers’s fault — it’s just where we find ourselves.
(Photo: https://www.amazon.com/Clouds-Witness-Dorothy-L-Sayers/dp/1494869810/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1582051880&sr=8-1)