meganbmoore: (Default)
meganbmoore ([personal profile] meganbmoore) wrote2008-02-25 02:33 am

Whose Body by Dorothy L. Sayers

Sayers's Lord Peter Wimsey books is a series I've been meaning to read for some time.  I've seen a BBC production of one of the books (involving, IIRC, Wimsey's sister's fiance being murdered and both her and their brother being suspects) but never read one.

Peter Wimsey is an upperclass gent in 1920s England, and a war veteran. At first glance, he comes across as (as I believe [personal profile] smillaraaqworded it to me a few days ago) "a superscilious upper-class fool."  I think my personal description would be "overly-absorbed, facetious twit."  This does, however, seem to largely be a surface personality, and the "real" Peter Wimsey is a determined, observant investigator who often aids Scotland Yard, dragging his valet, Bunter, along with him.  Most fans of the series I know seem to be fans primarily for later books in the series (which is also one of the draws for me, but I mustmustmust start series at the beginning) but this book stands up well on it's own.

Mostly a straightforward "whodunnit?" murder mystery, Wimsey is made aware of a body found in a bathtub wearing nothing but an expensive pince-nez, at the same time a prominent financier goes missing.  While there is an obvious conclusion to be drawn, and one Scotland Yard's investigator eagerly jumps at, Wimsey has his suspicions, though, and lauches his own investigations into the matter.

Mixed in, though, are hints and references to Wimsey's past, indicating that the war caused a mental breakdown of some sort, including a scene where he hallucinates that he's back in the war.  Perhaps I've simply encountered it too much in fiction and am jumping to conclusions, but I am assuming that Bunter is a war buddy of some sort, who entered Wimsey's service after the war.  (If so, it's a setup I typically find interesting.)

I have a confession to make, though:  I often got distracted from the plot by the excellent, witty dialogue, and had to reread some parts because of that.  And I probably still missed something...
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[identity profile] smillaraaq.livejournal.com 2008-02-25 10:57 am (UTC)(link)
I've seen a BBC production of one of the books (involving, IIRC, Wimsey's sister's fiance being murdered and both her and their brother being suspects) but never read one.

That would have been Clouds of Witness (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clouds_of_Witness) (spoilery Wiki page, but if you've seen the TV version I assume you're quite spoiled already); it's one of the books that were filmed with Ian Carmichael as Lord Peter back in the 1970s. I must confess rather shamefacedly that I have never seen any of the Carmichael versions -- they have their own fierce fan contingent, but since I came to the books by way of the Edward Petherbridge TV versions, he is THE perfect Lord Peter in my head and I'm not quite sure I could deal with someone else in the role.

And this honestly was one of the weakest of the lot for my tastes, not to say that it's a bad book but they just get better and better; so if you enjoyed this one, I have fairly high hopes that you'll like the rest of the series, too.

Most fans of the series I know seem to be fans primarily for later books in the series

I love both the pure mysteries and the Harriet-and-Peter books, but in different ways. The mysteries are light and witty, delightful period pieces chock-full of sparkling dialog and charmingly eccentric characters, the ones with Harriet add much more depth and heart to the formula.

Mixed in, though, are hints and references to Wimsey's past, indicating that the war caused a mental breakdown of some sort, including a scene where he hallucinates that he's back in the war. Perhaps I've simply encountered it too much in fiction and am jumping to conclusions, but I am assuming that Bunter is a war buddy of some sort, who entered Wimsey's service after the war.

Yep, Sergeant Bunter was Major Wimsey's batman during the Great War, and as I was mentioning in Cho's journal the other day, Peter suffered from a severe case of shell-shock. (Nothing terribly spoilery about this, this background is mostly just referred to in bits and pieces throughout the series without ever being a real plot point.) Bunter saved Peter's life during the war, and they made an agreement that if both survived, he'd take up service with Lord Peter when they resumed civilian life.

I often got distracted from the plot by the excellent, witty dialogue, and had to reread some parts because of that

Nothing wrong with that: I fell in love with these, and have reread them many times over the years, for the dialog and characters and literary and philosophical ramblings, not the plots. Without looking up references, I'd stand a better chance telling you which stories have passages going on about Bach fugues, or wine, or artistic temperaments, or the timelessness of ducks, rather than who got killed and whodunit.

BTW, if you want to be really, really strict about reading in pure story-chronological order, you should hurry up and get the short-story compilations: after Clouds of Witness, there are a bunch of stories that fall in the gap between the second and third novels (and you might even want to skip back to the one story that takes place before Whose Body?, which shows Peter first taking up his detective hobby.) There's a fairly thorough non-spoilery timeline here (http://www.leftfield.org/~rawdon/books/mystery/sayers.html) -- the only thing it's missing is Jill Paton Walsh's latest, A Presumption of Death, which is set in 1939, between the last two short stories "The Haunted Policeman" and "Talboys".

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-25 05:22 pm (UTC)(link)
"Yep, Sergeant Bunter was Major Wimsey's batman during the Great War...Bunter saved Peter's life during the war, and they made an agreement that if both survived, he'd take up service with Lord Peter when they resumed civilian life. "

And in the 80~ years since, it became one of the biggest romance novel cliches ever, especially for Regency era romances.

"and as I was mentioning in Cho's journal the other day, Peter suffered from a severe case of shell-shock. (Nothing terribly spoilery about this, this background is mostly just referred to in bits and pieces throughout the series without ever being a real plot point.)"

Yeah, the shell shock isn't really a spoiler, just clarifying something fairly obvious. I only vaguely skimmed your comments to Cho(well, the parts that looked spoilery) since I knew I'd be reading within the week.

"I fell in love with these, and have reread them many times over the years, for the dialog and characters and literary and philosophical ramblings, not the plots. Without looking up references, I'd stand a better chance telling you which stories have passages going on about Bach fugues, or wine, or artistic temperaments, or the timelessness of ducks, rather than who got killed and whodunit."

Well, honestly, that's the truth with most whodunnits. The murder mystery is there to give the interesting character something to do and a chance to show off his stuff, not the main focus.

I understand the Carmichael-Petheridge thing. I was introduced to Poirot via the Peter Unistov versions, but that was in junior high or so, and now that I've read a few of the books and seen all the David Suchet stuff, I can't imagine anyone but Suchet as Poirot.

As far as reading order goes...I'll likely go and get as many as I can find at the bookstore, find out what order they go in, order whatever I didn't find, then read them all once I have them all. Unless the short stories are mentioned in the books, I'll likely save them until after I've read all the books.
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[identity profile] smillaraaq.livejournal.com 2008-02-25 10:08 pm (UTC)(link)
Ah, I've read so few romances, and I think zero regencies so far, so I've mostly avoided that. My list of great literary valets pretty much starts with Jeeves and ends with Bunter...and since Bunter was somewhat inspired by Jeeves, that's not a terribly wide spectrum. ;)

And I think the Sayers rec in Cho's journal was fairly spoiler-free, aside from the "Harriet finally says yes" bit which I know I've already mentioned in your journal anyway...

Unless the short stories are mentioned in the books, I'll likely save them until after I've read all the books.

Not off the top of my head, they aren't -- at the very least even if they're referred to, it's just the random-comment-in-passing sort of thing that should neither ruin the stories for later reading or make the books incomprehensible without reading the stories first. Really, except for the Harriet Vane books, I don't think these would really suffer if you had to read a few of these out of order. The Harriet subseries do build strongly on the events of previous books, but the more straightforward mysteries are much more free-standing sorts of tales.

[identity profile] fmanalyst.livejournal.com 2008-02-25 12:33 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm from the Ian Carmichael period, although I enjoyed Petherbridge. But this series is my alltime favorite mystery series, and it still holds up very well as a picture of post WWI Britain.

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-25 05:23 pm (UTC)(link)
I suspect I'll end up checking out both versions in time.

[identity profile] nutmeg3.livejournal.com 2008-02-25 02:40 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm a Petherbridge fan, because I think he's much more like Book!Lord!Peter than Carmichael is. But also, he benefitted from being in the adaptations of the Harriet Vane entries in the series, and I much prefer those to the non-Harriet books.

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-25 05:24 pm (UTC)(link)
Ah, so the two adaptations don't cover identical ground? That's a plus.
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[identity profile] smillaraaq.livejournal.com 2008-02-25 10:17 pm (UTC)(link)
Yep. The Petherbridge series did the three main Harriet books -- Strong Poison, Have His Carcase, and Gaudy Night. If my memory of a show last seen, gulp, twenty years ago can be trusted, the first two were a bit more satisfying, as they weren't given any more time to cover the much longer and denser final novel, so Gaudy Night in particular felt rather rushed.

The Carmichael films cover Clouds of Witness, The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club, Murder Must Advertise, The Nine Tailors, and The Five Red Herrings.

[identity profile] mscongeniality.livejournal.com 2008-02-25 05:18 pm (UTC)(link)
I do love me some Lord Peter Wimsey.

I also see that a lot of points have already been addressed, but I did want to chime in and say that the books tend to get better as they go on. For me, that's less about the Peter/Harriet books and more about the stories becoming more cohesive and richer as she fleshed out the characters. Last spring, I went back and read Whose Body, The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club, etc. and in many ways Lord Peter felt like a caricature of himself in the early stories, compared to the character you see later.

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-25 05:26 pm (UTC)(link)
He felt somewhat like a caricature, here, but a deliberate one.

(Smilla is good at trying to cover every point imaginable.)

[identity profile] mscongeniality.livejournal.com 2008-02-25 06:48 pm (UTC)(link)
In the earliest ones, it really felt like she had a checklist of eccentricities that she wanted to get out on the table. Later on, she writes him as a person.

As for the TV versions, I like the Carmichael audios I've heard, though I've not seen his televised performances. He doesn't look at all like the way the character is described though. I own the Petherbridge version on DVD and, despite some mangling of Gaudy Night, lurve it dearly.

As for publication order:

Whose Body?
Clouds of Witness
Unnatural Death
The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club
Strong Poison
Five Red Herrings
Have His Carcase
Murder Must Advertise
The Nine Tailors
Gaudy Night
Busman's Honeymoon

They do get better as they go on, though Five Red Herrings is a bit dry for my tastes. The books that follow more than makes up for it, though. Also, none of the books are dependent on the short stories, so you can safely leave them to the end if you want.

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-25 11:58 pm (UTC)(link)
I would never accuse you of such a thing.
ext_12512: Hinoe from Natsume Yuujinchou, elegant and smirky (Default)

[identity profile] smillaraaq.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 10:57 am (UTC)(link)
...since you can count on me to freely admit to it.

(It's a fair cop, guv'nor!)

[identity profile] fairest1.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 12:23 am (UTC)(link)
Weird timing -- I was just digging through a box of books yesterday and found this, along with a couple other Sayers novels.

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 12:25 am (UTC)(link)
It's popping up everywhere. I say we just blame Smilla.

[identity profile] fairest1.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 02:43 am (UTC)(link)
Who's that? Do they have the power to make novels randomly appear in front of you? Do they take requests?

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 02:45 am (UTC)(link)
smillaraaq.

She has the power to make certain things come up everywhere you look.

[identity profile] fairest1.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 02:50 am (UTC)(link)
Ah, right. This power must be harnessed.
ext_12512: Hinoe from Natsume Yuujinchou, elegant and smirky (Default)

[identity profile] smillaraaq.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 08:46 am (UTC)(link)
You have NO idea how often I hear that. Do I have a sign over my head that reads "Good Scapegoat"?

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 08:53 am (UTC)(link)
Nah.

It says "pimps anything and everything she can think of with a millimeter of an opening."

It's not a bad sign to have, really...
ext_12512: Hinoe from Natsume Yuujinchou, elegant and smirky (Default)

[identity profile] smillaraaq.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 09:52 am (UTC)(link)
Yeah, yeah, just call me Iceberg Smil. Pimping ain't easy.

Seriously, I only pimp out things I really, REALLY like. And in any category, that's a pretty small subset compared to all the "stuff I wanted to throw across a room" and "stuff that made no lasting impression beyond a resounding meh".

(On the "hurl away with great force" anti-pimp front, I'm currently developing a Cassie Edwards drinking game (http://saskaia.livejournal.com/334357.html?thread=2792469#t2792469)...)

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 05:23 pm (UTC)(link)
Oops, I accidentally replied to you there. Ah well. *edits in apology*

If I followed that drinking game, I would have been dead of alcohol poisoning in that book I read. Especially since I don't drink.

But one of the books has an undead heroine? Seriously? Which?

ext_12512: Hinoe from Natsume Yuujinchou, elegant and smirky (Default)

[identity profile] smillaraaq.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 06:00 pm (UTC)(link)
Savage Grace (http://www.amazon.com/Savage-Historical-Romance-Cassie-Edwards/dp/0886465729). I mooched a couple of CE's Cherokee titles for [livejournal.com profile] saskaia, who much like me was just UTTERLY thrilled to see her own nation had come in for the Edwards treatment. So of course I had to read through 'em myself first to share the pain before passing them along, and to sort of fortify my courage before Savage Honor gets here.

I was expecting the bad writing and the wooden characters and the blatantly plagiarized passages and all that. But while I was expecting the plot to be stupid, I really wasn't prepared for it to literally be at the level where divine intervention had to be involved!

The heroine, a conveniently widowed and implausibly-named redheaded young mother, is killed off within the first two or three chapters by a renegade band of Bad Indians and their Bad White Buddies, who in an earlier chapter had gone and critically wounded the Mighty Wang hero (also a convenient widower). Bad Renegade Leader, who's been exiled from his tribe ever since Mighty Wang exposed his badness, steals her infant son (who of course has easily recognizable red hair and a birthmark) as a present for his sister, who is not bad but has gone into exile anyway out of loyalty to her brother and love for one of his Bad White Buddies. Her Bad White Husband has been killed while out doing Bad Things with her brother, and the shock and grief provoked a miscarriage for reasons of plot, so he's hoping a random white baby he found lying around will perk her up...hey, FTD and Hallmark hadn't been invented yet.

So, the hero's off dying in the woods and the heroine is dead. In a perfect world, the story would have ended there. But nooooooo. Our heroine now has an audience with God, who explains that she has a choice to go on to heaven or return to earth as an angel, where she will be tested and yadda yadda if she passes she will be given the chance to come back to life and eventually be reunited with her son yadda yadda yadda. And it just gets stupider and stupider from there.

Also, Mighty Wang hero has a hunting dog who routinely pulls off "what's that, girl, Sexy-Modifier-Sexy-Animal fell down the well?" stunts.

And did I mention the really, really bad poetry?

Or the evil character who's been an enabler and coconspirator of one of the main villains -- until the main baddie caught out and exiled, and then suddenly the supporting baddie just stops being bad?

Or remember the stolen baby? Who was still nursing when he was stolen? Which the author conveniently manages to forget all about over the course of several days worth of story time and multiple sex scenes including lots of breast stimulation, until she finally decides the heroine suddenly needs to develop a case of painful milk engorgement for reasons of plot? (Insert huge S_D style "BREASTS DON'T WORK THAT WAY" tag here.)

And if you thought her prose was bad...wait 'til you see her idea of poetry.

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 06:32 pm (UTC)(link)
It actually sounds worse than the one I read.

I think I'll save myself. (If I don't get rid of the other 2 sitting here soon, though, I may cave to temptation...)

One thing of curiosity, though: The villain in SA was portrayed as evil at least partly because he wanted to rape the heroine...but not simply because he wanted to rape her, but because he wanted to rape her because he thought she was a boy. Something like that I wouldn't have noticed in high school, but I'm wondering if it's a common element in the books.
ext_12512: Hinoe from Natsume Yuujinchou, elegant and smirky (Default)

[identity profile] smillaraaq.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 06:54 pm (UTC)(link)
As I said in my comments on the drinking game thread, the other Edwards I'm slogging through right now is still pretty damn awful, but not quite as deranged as the first one.

So far, there's been no crossdressing in either one, so maybe that was just a special touch for SH? SG didn't have any rape attempts, Savage Persuasion so far has had one at the very beginning -- the heroine and her twin sister are assaulted, as they expected they might be, by their skeezy drunken uncles who may or may not have been responsible for killing the girls' parents while placing the blame on Indian raiders.

(The girls are identical twins...except for notably non-identical eye color. MONOZYGOTIC TWINS DON'T WORK THAT WAY, etc.)

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 07:04 pm (UTC)(link)
Maybe. It stood out because it was very much "evil because he's gay" as opposed to "evil, but also gay." Which, you know, is a huge difference. And I thought we were past "gay=evil rapist" in fiction...
ext_12512: Hinoe from Natsume Yuujinchou, elegant and smirky (Default)

[identity profile] smillaraaq.livejournal.com 2008-02-28 12:06 pm (UTC)(link)
This is a woman who's built her entire career on perpetuating Noble Savage garbage, and you're surprised that she holds to other retrograde attitudes? *blink*

Along with the "gay = evil rapist" and "woman should do whatever the man says" of the book you waded through, I bet you'd loooooooove the two I've been battling with. They add in "fat = evil", "poor hygiene = evil", "woman who likes sex too much but isn't goopy about motherhood = evil", and oh yeah, "crossdressers = ok, maybe not quite *evil*, but definitely pathetic, unmanly, and good only for mockery and working as beauticians".

Stupid, OTOH, does not equal evil in the Edwards-verse, because at this point I'm pretty sure the only character with an IQ higher than room temperature is the dog in Savage Grace...

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-28 05:39 pm (UTC)(link)
Hmm...yeah, there were hints of some of those in SH...and I remember them from the books I read in high school.

Sadly, there was no pet in SH to bring up the general IQ level...
ext_8730: (Default)

[identity profile] maerhys.livejournal.com 2008-02-29 01:55 pm (UTC)(link)
Does she not understand basic biology? No, wait. I am sure she doesn't.
ext_12512: Hinoe from Natsume Yuujinchou, elegant and smirky (Default)

[identity profile] smillaraaq.livejournal.com 2008-02-29 03:46 pm (UTC)(link)
More like she didn't have a basic breastfeeding book handy to lift text from...
ext_8730: (Default)

[identity profile] maerhys.livejournal.com 2008-02-29 03:54 pm (UTC)(link)
LOL! Made of win, 'cause it's true.

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-29 05:39 pm (UTC)(link)
I am somewhat ashamed to say that, having encountered fraternal, m/f twins spawned from the same egg(one of whom tried to kill the other in the womb...), things like that don't bother me quite as much anymore.
ext_8730: (Default)

[identity profile] maerhys.livejournal.com 2008-02-29 07:25 pm (UTC)(link)
Wow. I can see that being lower on the list. hee.

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-29 07:43 pm (UTC)(link)
After that, all "biogenetics don't work that way" attempts are just...lacking...
ext_12512: Hinoe from Natsume Yuujinchou, elegant and smirky (Default)

[identity profile] smillaraaq.livejournal.com 2008-02-29 09:17 pm (UTC)(link)
Western comics or manga or...?

And it's still a pretty minor quibble next to the other book's "heroine comes back from the dead" deus ex machina, but still...I think what makes it particularly noxious here is that even with the eye-color difference to conveniently tell them apart, the plot such as it is mostly hinges on the girls constantly being mistaken for each other, to the point where the Poor Dumb Injuns are confused and freaked out and thinking spirits are at work until the Nice White Girls explain about twins.

No, REALLY.

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-29 10:23 pm (UTC)(link)
Xavier and his twin sister in Morrison's X-Men run. I try to forget it exists.

That book sounds even more brain cells killing than the one I read.
ext_8730: (Default)

[identity profile] maerhys.livejournal.com 2008-02-29 01:55 pm (UTC)(link)
I am going to need prescription pain meds for this book, AMIRITE?

ext_12512: Hinoe from Natsume Yuujinchou, elegant and smirky (Default)

[identity profile] smillaraaq.livejournal.com 2008-02-29 03:45 pm (UTC)(link)
I don't know if a morphine drip would be strong enough -- you might need near-lethal doses for effective pain management.
ext_8730: (Default)

[identity profile] maerhys.livejournal.com 2008-02-29 03:53 pm (UTC)(link)
I'll stock up on the fentynal and Oxy IR.

I brought the Savage WTFeverit'scalled with me to work...
ext_12512: Hinoe from Natsume Yuujinchou, elegant and smirky (Default)

[identity profile] smillaraaq.livejournal.com 2008-02-29 03:56 pm (UTC)(link)
*snickers* I think I shall retitle all of them Savage Fill-In-The-Blank...
ext_8730: (Default)

[identity profile] maerhys.livejournal.com 2008-02-29 07:24 pm (UTC)(link)
LOL! It's so true.

[identity profile] ladysaotome.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 11:10 pm (UTC)(link)
I just recently finished reading all the Wimsey novels (in 2 months) excepting the compilations which I'm working on at the moment. I loved the books from the opening swear in Whose Body but Wimsey affection steadily grows throughout. Tried sitting through an Ian Charmichael version of The Nine Tailors but disliked it too much to finish (they spoiled the entire mystery right from the beginning?!).

I did sometimes skim when the descriptions took up multiple paraghraphs, etc. But otherwise, they are fun to read. I have to confess I loved Bunter most, though, & was highly disappointed that his role decreases as the series progresses.

[identity profile] meganbmoore.livejournal.com 2008-02-26 11:14 pm (UTC)(link)
I think I liked Bunter best, too.
ext_12512: Hinoe from Natsume Yuujinchou, elegant and smirky (Default)

[identity profile] smillaraaq.livejournal.com 2008-02-27 07:23 pm (UTC)(link)
That's probably the biggest downside of both MMA and the Harriet books -- less Bunter.