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It was the body of a tall stout man. On his dead face, a handsome pair of gold pince-nez mocked death with grotesque elegance. The body wore nothing else.Lord Peter Wimsey knew immediately what the corpse was supposed to be. His problem was to find out whose body had found its way into Mr Alfred Thipps' Battersea bathroom.
Lord Peter Wimsey has married at last, having finally succeeded in his ardent pursuit of the lovely mystery novelist Harriet Vane. The two depart for a tranquil honeymoon in a country farmhouse but find, instead of a well-prepared love nest, the place left in a shambles by the previous owner. His sudden appearance, dead from a broken skull in the cellar, only prompts more questions. Why would anyone have wanted to kill old Mr Noakes? What dark secrets had he to hide?
When Sandy Campbell's body is found at the foot of a cliff near the small town of Kircdubright, the local constabulary are convinced that the argumentative painter is a victim of a tragic accident. But when Lord Peter Wimsey turns up, the hunt begins for an ingenious killer. Faced with six men, all of whom have a motive for murder, the aristocratic amateur sleuth must deduce which are the five red herrings and which has blood on his hands.
When copywriter Victor Dean falls to his death on the stairs of Pym's Advertising Agency, everyone assumes it was an unfortunate accident. His replacement doesn't think so and begins asking a lot of questions. The new man is something of a mystery to his colleagues, and he certainly dresses well considering his meagre writer's salary.
The elegant, intelligent amateur sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey is one of detective literature's most popular creations. Ian Carmichael is the personification of Dorothy L. Sayers' charming investigator in this BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation. The dignified calm of the Bellona Club is shattered when Lord Wimsey finds General Fentiman dead in his favourite chair. A straighforward death by natural causes? Perhaps... but why can no one remember seeing the general the day he died?
Wimsey’s mother, the Dowager Duchess of Denver, rings her son with news of ‘such a quaint thing’. She has heard through a friend that Mr Thipps, a respectable Battersea architect, found a dead man in his bath – wearing nothing but a gold prince-nez. Lord Wimsey makes his way straight over to Mr Thipps, and a good look at the body raises a number of interesting questions. Why would such an apparantly well-groomed man have filthy black toenails, flea bites and the scent of carbolic soap lingering on his corpse?
It was the body of a tall stout man. On his dead face, a handsome pair of gold pince-nez mocked death with grotesque elegance. The body wore nothing else.Lord Peter Wimsey knew immediately what the corpse was supposed to be. His problem was to find out whose body had found its way into Mr Alfred Thipps' Battersea bathroom.
Lord Peter Wimsey has married at last, having finally succeeded in his ardent pursuit of the lovely mystery novelist Harriet Vane. The two depart for a tranquil honeymoon in a country farmhouse but find, instead of a well-prepared love nest, the place left in a shambles by the previous owner. His sudden appearance, dead from a broken skull in the cellar, only prompts more questions. Why would anyone have wanted to kill old Mr Noakes? What dark secrets had he to hide?
When Sandy Campbell's body is found at the foot of a cliff near the small town of Kircdubright, the local constabulary are convinced that the argumentative painter is a victim of a tragic accident. But when Lord Peter Wimsey turns up, the hunt begins for an ingenious killer. Faced with six men, all of whom have a motive for murder, the aristocratic amateur sleuth must deduce which are the five red herrings and which has blood on his hands.
When copywriter Victor Dean falls to his death on the stairs of Pym's Advertising Agency, everyone assumes it was an unfortunate accident. His replacement doesn't think so and begins asking a lot of questions. The new man is something of a mystery to his colleagues, and he certainly dresses well considering his meagre writer's salary.
The elegant, intelligent amateur sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey is one of detective literature's most popular creations. Ian Carmichael is the personification of Dorothy L. Sayers' charming investigator in this BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation. The dignified calm of the Bellona Club is shattered when Lord Wimsey finds General Fentiman dead in his favourite chair. A straighforward death by natural causes? Perhaps... but why can no one remember seeing the general the day he died?
Wimsey’s mother, the Dowager Duchess of Denver, rings her son with news of ‘such a quaint thing’. She has heard through a friend that Mr Thipps, a respectable Battersea architect, found a dead man in his bath – wearing nothing but a gold prince-nez. Lord Wimsey makes his way straight over to Mr Thipps, and a good look at the body raises a number of interesting questions. Why would such an apparantly well-groomed man have filthy black toenails, flea bites and the scent of carbolic soap lingering on his corpse?
The elegant, intelligent amateur sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey is one of detective literature's most popular creations, and Ian Carmichael is the personification of Dorothy L. Sayers' charming investigator in this BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation. Lord Peter Wimsey, man about town and amateur sleuth, and his man Bunter, are drawn into a series of intriguing incidents after being stranded in the remote village of Fenchurch St. Paul.
It is 1936, and Lord Peter Wimsey has returned from his honeymoon to set up home with his cherished new wife, the novelist Harriet Vane. As they become part of fashionable London society, they encounter the glamorous socialite Rosamund Harwell and her wealthy impresario husband, Laurence. Unlike the Wimseys they are not in love - and all too soon, one of them is dead. A murder case that only Lord Peter Wimsey can solve.
The best of the golden-age crime writers, praised by all the top modern writers in the field, including P. D. James and Ruth Rendell, Dorothy L. Sayers created the immortal Lord Peter Wimsey. But in this thrilling murder story, she tells her story instead through the letters of the victim and the suspects. The bed was broken and tilted grotesquely sideways. Harrison was sprawled over in a huddle of soiled blankets.
Discover Dorothy L. Sayers' inimitable Golden Age detective in this complete collection of the complete Lord Peter Wimsey stories, together in one volume for the first time. Presented in chronological order, these short stories see Lord Peter Wimsey bringing his trademark wit and unique detection skills to all manner of mysteries.
Whose Body? first introduced Lord Peter to the world and begins with a corpse in the bath of a London flat. Clouds of Witness finds Wimsey investigating murder close to home, and in Unnatural Death he investigates the suspicious demise of an elderly woman. First broadcast on BBC radio in the 1970s and presented here in their entirety, these full-cast adaptations are admired by fans of the genre worldwide.
Ian Carmichael stars as Lord Peter Wimsey in the much-acclaimed radio dramatisations of Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club, Strong Poison, Five Red Herrings and Have His Carcase.
In these two dramas, she puts her extraordinary mind to work investigating cases of disguise, dismemberment, mayhem and murder. In Speedy Death, a country house in the 1920s is rocked by a murder which takes place in a room which is first locked, then later unlocked. As fingers point and the suspects begin to turn on each other, another death occurs. Then The Mystery of a Butcher's Shop sees Mrs Bradley investigating as a headless body is found in the butcher's shop.
Wealthy Sir Hubert Handesley's original and lively weekend house parties are deservedly famous. To amuse his guests, he has devised a new form of the fashionable Murder Game, in which a guest is secretly selected to commit a 'murder' in the dark, and everyone assembles to solve the crime. But when the lights go up this time, there is a real corpse....
When George Abbershaw is invited to Black Dudley Manor for the weekend, he has only one thing on his mind - proposing to Meggie Oliphant. Unfortunately for George, things don't quite go according to plan. A harmless game turns decidedly deadly and suspicions of murder take precedence over matrimony. Trapped in a remote country house with a murderer, George can see no way out. But Albert Campion can.
A Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation starring June Whitfield as the deceptively mild Miss Marple with Ian Lavender, Joan Sims and Susannah Harker. Elspeth McGillicuddy is down from Scotland for a holiday and boards the 4:50 train from Paddington station to visit her friend, Miss Marple. During the journey, another train pulls alongside, and through the window Mrs McGillicuddy witnesses a tall, dark man strangling a blonde woman. She reports what she has seen, yet no one takes any notice.
Seven BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisations of P. D. James' acclaimed mysteries, plus P. D. James in Her Own Words. This collection includes: Cover Her Face, A Taste for Death, Devices and Desires, A Certain Justice, The Private Patient, An Unsuitable Job for a Woman and The Skull Beneath the Skin.
Three BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisations starring John Shrapnel as Morse and Robert Glenister as Lewis, plus a bonus reading by Colin Dexter of one of his short stories. In Last Seen Wearing, Inspector Morse is reluctant to take over an old missing person case from a dead colleague. But two years, three months and two days after teenager Valerie Taylor's disappearance, somebody decides to supply some surprising new evidence....
The best of the golden age crime writers, praised by all the top modern writers in the field including P. D. James and Ruth Rendell, Dorothy L. Sayers created the immortal Lord Peter Wimsey.
In his eighth appearance (and the second book featuring Harriet Vane), he solves a murder on a deserted English beach. With an introduction by Elizabeth George.
A young woman falls asleep on a deserted beach and wakes to discover the body of a man whose throat has been slashed from ear to ear...
The young woman is the celebrated detective novelist Harriet Vane, once again drawn against her will into a murder investigation in which she herself could be a suspect. Lord Peter Wimsey is only too eager to help her clear her name.
I love the Lord Peter Wimsey books and listening to them could be a real treat if it wasn't for the awful reader. She misses commas, mispronounces words and overall sometimes makes it hard to understand what she is reading. Her French accent has been learned from a computer and she doesn't know what she is saying! Please, please have someone else read these gorgeous books, someone with a more pleasant voice who can actually read? I've got three books read by her and I'm not getting more, not because of the stories - they are fab, that goes without saying - but because of that unpleasant, sharp voice and the total lack of understanding what she's reading.
4 of 4 people found this review helpful
The book is narrated in a lifeless monotone. Characterisation is particularly poor and and conversational passages are utterly dreadful.
Wimsey is not well served by this joyless rendition.
3 of 3 people found this review helpful
Need to say that this reading is better than some of earlier ones in series...thank goodness! Less "affected" and hence more convincing!
2 of 2 people found this review helpful
What did you like most about Have His Carcase?
the relationship between Wimsey and Harriet
What other book might you compare Have His Carcase to, and why?
five red herrings, both very complicated plots
What does Jane McDowell bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you had only read the book?
period placement
If you made a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?
do you believe her?
2 of 2 people found this review helpful
I've always liked the Peter Wimsey series and never liked Ian Carmichael's reading (he mumbles too much). So this new set of recordings delights me. The narrator has a pleasant clear deep voice and manages all the voices and accents well. She is a pleasure to listen to.
I remember reading this story many, many years ago and not liking it much but as an audiobook it is probably one of my favourites so far. I did remember the solution (well, the trick of the solution) but nothing else about it.
I enjoyed the interplay between Harrriet and Peter and I know there is more in Gaudy Night.
Just for the record, I fail to find fault with a woman reading a book with a male protagonist if it is done well and in this series it is done very well.
Full marks, Audible, and keep them coming.
4 of 5 people found this review helpful
What did you like best about Have His Carcase? What did you like least?
The narrator. Why would you have a female narrator for a male lead? Her accent is forced and annoying. A lot of the nuances of the story are lost because of the narration.
Who was your favorite character and why?
Wimsey but not the way it's read.
Would you be willing to try another one of Jane McDowell’s performances?
No
Was Have His Carcase worth the listening time?
The story but not the voice
Any additional comments?
This is a wonderful story and I would buy it again with someone else reading it
4 of 5 people found this review helpful
Not my favourite of the Lord Peter Wimsey novels, but a good tale and an important point in the Peter/Harriet story. It is generally well read and Jane McDowell has a good voice for the story. I question the wisdom of reading out every letter in the ciphered document, which gets very tedious to listen to. Also, there are a few excruciating mispronunciations, not just of names (e.g. Bredon) but ordinary words like "mischievous". I'm not sure I will listen to it more than once.
4 of 5 people found this review helpful
The works of Dorothy L Sayers have long been favourites, both the dramatised and the unabridged audio versions of the books. As there are more of the former, I was delighted to see the complete works being recorded in their full versions. Until I listened to this narrator. She has no distictintive 'voice for Lord Peter Wimsey, which means it is often impossible to tell when he is speaking. This is incredible, given his ststus as the protaganist. When she manages a distinct accent for any other character, it slips within a few sentences. The beauty of Sayers work is partly in the wonderful cameo depictions of a great many minor characters, which are utterly lost in this narration. I felt there was no real pleasure in, or understanding of the text from the narrator. I have not bought any of the other books in this series read by this narrator, and am grateful that I have had the chance instead to collect as many of the Ian Carmichael readings as possible over the years. The 'Five Red Herrings as read by Patrick Malihide (?) is also excellent, with wonderful evocative Scottish Galloway accents. The only positive thing to have come out of these new editions are the beautiful graphics for the covers. Sadly, that simply isn't enough in an audio format. I am very sad to think that people new to this author may be turned off a fine writer by such a poor narrator.
OK but timetables and clue solving been read out is terribly tedious. Sayers seems to have had a fondness for that type of thing.
The story of this book was advertised as Harriet Vane waking up on a beach and finding a dead body at the side of her. She is accused of the murder and Lord Peter Wimsey arrives to prove her innocent. That is all absolutely untrue. She wakes up and walks for ten minutes before she finds a body and the police never seriously suspect her of murder. So this audio book was sold under false pretences. The story is rambling and full of unnecessary, boring detail. Not impressed and not what I expected.
1 of 6 people found this review helpful
The above combination and With Harriet Vane..this is a brilliant book. In typical Sayers style..the mystery unpeels like an omion, in so many layers...Enjoyed the plot and more so the performance. Thanks.