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A Presumption of Death
 
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A Presumption of Death (Paperback)

by Dorothy L Sayers (Author), Jill Paton Walsh (Author)
2.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
RRP: £6.99
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Frequently Bought Together

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Price For All Three: £16.97

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Product details

  • Paperback: 384 pages
  • Publisher: New English Library; New Ed edition (26 May 2003)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0340820675
  • ISBN-13: 978-0340820674
  • Product Dimensions: 17.6 x 11 x 2.8 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 2.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 16,731 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in this category:

    #2 in  Books > Fiction > Authors, A-Z > W > Walsh, Jill Paton

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Product Description

Joyce Carol Oates, New York Times Book Review
‘An engrossing, intelligent and provocative novel in the guise of a conventional mystery.'

Review
'Jill Paton Walsh has...given us a Lord Peter story in the true Sayers' style and tradition' (Norma Major - The Week on Thrones, Dominations )

‘An engrossing, intelligent and provocative novel in the guise of a conventional mystery.’ (Joyce Carol Oates, New York Times Book Review )

‘Could this be the best book Dorothy L. Sayers never wrote? She has done a splendid job - certain to please the legions of Sayers loyalists as well as readers new to the Wimsey canon . . . Lord Peter has been made much more human and interesting by marriage. . . and the story is full of twists and connivance.’ (Chicago Tribune on THRONES, DOMINATIONS )

'A must for all Wimsey lovers...an entertaining read which offers some longed for insight into the lives of the Wimseys after their marriage' (Northern Echo (Presumption of Death) )

'Vintage whimsey ... Wimsey lives on in delicious familiarity in this triupmh not just of one writer's art, but of two' (Huddersfield Daily Examiner (Presumption of Death) )

'An admirable page-turner with some fascinating detail' (Publishing News )

'Jill Paton Walsh excels as Ms Sayers' posthumous voice. As before the two authors blend seamlessly and the intricately woven plot would grace anything from the golden age of detective writing' (Norfolk Journal (Presumption of Death) )

"Undeniably fascinating reading for lovers of good crime novels - nad, in particular, those who loved the Lord Peter Wimsey series." (Liverpool Echo )

"A must for all Wimsey lovers, this beautifully written novel is a murder mystery in the style of Agatha Christie." (Lancashire Evening Post )

"A truly engaging read" (Lancashire Evening Post )

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A Presumption of Death
76% buy the item featured on this page:
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Customer Reviews

10 Reviews
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4 star:
 (3)
3 star:
 (1)
2 star:
 (4)
1 star:
 (1)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
2.9 out of 5 stars (10 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
30 of 31 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars Not Dorothy L Sayers, 4 April 2005
By Davywavy2 - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   
There is an excerpt of this book on Amazon. You might read it and think "Good heavens, this catches the tone of Sayers perfectly!". Well, of course it does. That's because the excerpt is lifted directly from Sayers' short story "The man who knew how" with just names and a few details changed and then inserted into this new book. The rest of the book doesn't live up to the writing of Sayers by a long chalk and this sort of underhand marketing ploy to make the reader think they're getting something they're not really ticks me off, especially when it is my money that they're taking.
Sayers had a delightful gift for characterisation and dialogue which few authors can manage. Jill Paton Walsh deserves credit for trying, but ultimately the fact that the publishers knew they had to run original Sayers dialogue to promote the book tells the potential buyer all they need to know.
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30 of 31 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars An enjoyable mystery to delight Wimsey fans!, 25 Oct 2002
By A Customer
This review is from: A Presumption of Death (Hardcover)
This book is a must for all Wimsey-lovers as we are reunited with Peter and Harriet in the first two years of the Second World War. Peter makes his appearance late in the novel but Harriet is as engaging as ever taking centre stage. Her longng for her husband keeps Lord Peter firmy in the reader's consciousness. He may not appear quite enough for everyone's taste, but his reappearance at all more than makes up for it.

The mystery itself is not particularly thrilling; most of your suspicions or hunches will prove to be right. The book compensates for this with a delightful development of the relationship between Peter and Harriet and with a real sense of period. The fear of the early was years is vividly brought home and the uncertainty felt will strike a chord with society after September 11. This is not enough to make it a great read for those unfamiliar wth Wimsey - the Wimsey uninitiated would be well advised to start elsewhere - but Jill Paton Walsh has tied the book carefully with the Wimsey Papers published in The Spectator in 1939-1940 and sets the stage more clearly for the short story Talboys (in "Striding Folly"). As with Dorothy L Sayers books, the characterisation is endearing.
Jill Paton Walsh may not have produced another work like "Thrones, Dominations", (her completion of Dorothy L Sayers unfinished Wimsey novel) but it is nevertheless an entertaining read which offers some longed for insight into the lives of the Wimseys after their marriage.

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23 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars Worth the effort?, 30 Jan 2003
By Patricia Boyce - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This review is from: A Presumption of Death (Hardcover)
It's difficult to imagine a more thankless task than taking on the burden of recreating much loved fictional characters long after their creator's death, as the principal audience is likely to be people with their own, longstanding views about the characters. I'd admit to falling into this category. Having acknowledged that, however, I found this book more disappointing than its predecessor.

The earlier "collaboration" between Jill Paton Walsh and Dorothy Sayers to my eye owed much of its vitality and richness to those parts of the text substantially similar to other, earlier material by Dorothy Sayers. This "collaboration" has neither. Lord Peter Wimsey is a pale, wan character, while the former Harriet Vane appears to have been arrested in her development, making gauche and embittered responses in a series of exchanges that are surprisingly unsophisticated. Helen, the Duchess, is now a devitalised villian, bought on to be booed from the stalls. The Wimseys display a remarkable, if unpersuasive conversion to middle class values, while the Duke appears to be on the way to proto-socialism.

Worth the effort? If there's to be a further "collaboration", I won't be buying it...

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Seems like a Sayer's collaboration
This book takes place mainly in a small village in the countryside of England. The time, Wartime England, covering the end of 1939 through early 1940. Read more
Published 21 months ago by M. A. Ramos

2.0 out of 5 stars Not recommended
Die-hard Dorothy L Sayers fans should give this one a miss, as the tone and writing style bear little or no resmblance to anything that DLS wrote. Read more
Published on 21 Mar 2007 by Elizabeth Trigg

2.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing
In an obvious plot, full of lapses of logic and reasoning and sadly lacking in the sort of characterisation which made the Sayers characters special, Harriet becomes stupid, Lord... Read more
Published on 28 Sep 2005

2.0 out of 5 stars A Presumption of death
Although fairly well written this book holds no comparison to the original Lord Peter Wimsey series. Read more
Published on 5 Nov 2004 by vickedy19

4.0 out of 5 stars A must for Peter Wimsey fans
Jill Paton-Walsh has captured the essence of Lord Peter and Harriet so well in this novel - its difficult to remember that it wasn't written by D L Sayers herself. Read more
Published on 27 Aug 2004 by janewilliams22

4.0 out of 5 stars A delightful read
Harriet Vane (now Wimsey) has always been one of the delights of the Dorothy L Sayers books and considerably more consistent and believable as a character than Lord Peter - this... Read more
Published on 24 Oct 2003

5.0 out of 5 stars Wimsey/Vane revisited
I was delighted when my husband gave me this book as a Xmas present for I was able to extend my knowledge of Lord Peters' life and times through its' pages. Read more
Published on 29 Dec 2002 by Mrs. Sheila M. H. Baggott

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