by Dorothy Sayers, novel first published in 1923, Audiobook narrated by David Case, 2015, Blackstone Audio

This book is Dorothy Sayers first novel and it was received with critical acclaim when it was published in 1923. Most of the detective novels in those days were authored by male authors, so it was a phenomenon when female authors arrived on the scene. I found out about Dorothy in the novel Queens of Crime which used the person of Dorothy to be the primary character in that historical crime novel. I decided to check out some of Dorothy’s books to experience her writing firsthand.

The book is about a body discovered in a bathtub that wasn’t immediately identified. Lord Peter Wimsey, an amateur detective with some personal ties to individuals in Scotland Yard, decides to investigate. The police initially make some assumptions about the identity, but they are hasty, and Peter suspects that they are not correct.

The issue with this book is not the book itself, but the narration. David Case has a high, somewhat irritating voice. The plot is fairly complicated, and Peter Wimsey’s deductive thinking is hard to follow because the tempo is so high. I am currently reading Sayer’s second book in the series to get a better sense of Wimsey’s character and Sayer’s writing. I suspect I will get a different impression. I wouldn’t recommend the book in audio format, but I think it might be a lot better in print.