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Title: Not as good as the other Peter Wimsey mysteries
Review: I'd read and enjoyed a few of the Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries by Dorothy Sayers years ago when the PBS series was on, so I eagerly looked forward to this one when I saw it on Amazon. However, I was very disappointed. Since a whodunit has to have many characters, the problem is that the female characters, of which there are many, are barely distinguishable from one another and are rather colorless. Even the protagonist, Harriet Vane, is insipid. The only one who is at all interesting is Lord Peter himself, but he is not around for much of the novel. In addition, Lord Peter is madly in love with Harriet, so that detracts from his attractiveness. The plot itself is fairly well thought out, but I knew the solution before the end. The other problem is Sayer's feminist agenda which is a bit shrill, overtaking both plot and characters. That agenda is also rather outdated and simplistic in this 1936 story.
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