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mschlat's review
2.0
This is a nice collection, but nothing that I feel is truly necessary to the canon. Most of the short stories are early in the Wimsey chronology, and - being short - like to play around with concepts and gimmicks rather than explore the characters. Sometimes this works wonderfully, as in a tale which involves solving a crossword puzzle to find a missing will. Other times, I felt the gimmick was a bit too much. (There's a story of Peter faking his death for two years to break up a criminal syndicate that I refuse to take as canon.) Regardless, the prose and dialogue is up to what I expect from Sayer's best.
There are two later stories which feature Peter and Harriet (and children) and are among my favorite in the book. (The image of Wimsey as a new father is brilliant.) There's also a somewhat fawning history of Sayers and Wimsey that helped me understand the author's transition from detective fiction to theology and classical translation. And the volume ends with a Wimsey spoof which does a good job of aping Sayer's dialogue but decides to (jokingly) associate Wimsey with Nazism, resulting in little interest on my part.
There are two later stories which feature Peter and Harriet (and children) and are among my favorite in the book. (The image of Wimsey as a new father is brilliant.) There's also a somewhat fawning history of Sayers and Wimsey that helped me understand the author's transition from detective fiction to theology and classical translation. And the volume ends with a Wimsey spoof which does a good job of aping Sayer's dialogue but decides to (jokingly) associate Wimsey with Nazism, resulting in little interest on my part.
ssejig's review
5.0
A collection of Lord Peter Wimsey stories. Short, lovely, and altogether enjoyable.
wealhtheow's review
3.0
I picked this up a year or so ago and *hated* the first story I read, which I thought priggishly class conscious. After reading the Wimsey novels, I liked the stories a great deal more, and would recommend them only after a reader has read at least one or two of Sayers's novels.
jlsigman's review
Could not finish. The type is really small, and I'm not enjoying it enough to deal with the eye strain.
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