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The Documents in the Case

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The Documents in the Case

By: Dorothy L Sayers, Robert Eustace
Narrated by: Jane McDowell
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About this listen

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. His mouth was twisted.... Harrison had been an expert on deadly mushrooms. How was it then that he had eaten a large quantity of death-dealing muscarine? Was it an accident? Suicide? Or murder?

The documents in the case seemed to be a simple collection of love notes and letters home. But they concealed a clue to the brilliant murderer who baffled the best minds in London.

"She combined literary prose with powerful suspense, and it takes a rare talent to achieve that. A truly great storyteller." (Minette Walters)

©1927 Trustees of Anthony Fleming (deceased) (P)2015 Hodder & Stoughton Crime Crime Fiction Murder Mystery Traditional Detectives Fiction Detective Exciting Suspense
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Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

Yes, definitely. It is full of really interesting scientific information combined with a great story. The narrator is excellent.

What did you like best about this story?

It was very detailed and a real mystery right to the end. Dorothy Sayers at her absolute best and one I hadn't actually read in book form.

Have you listened to any of Jane McDowell’s other performances? How does this one compare?

No but will certainly look for others of hers.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

No, it was far too long but I listened to it on a couple of long car journeys and wanted to keep on listening.

Any additional comments?

It is quite intellectually challenging and does need some concentration to grasp all the intricacies of the plot and the documents of the case!

Brilliant, gripping and a great performance

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The very first real scientific murder mystery, despite what the know-it-all losers say. In addition it is a supercool letter-based book. The know-it-alls of course rejected it, because they are "special"

Extraordinary good scientic mystery

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For once, a different kind of Dorothy L Sayers whodunnit without the wit of Lord Peter Wimsey! Intriguing, but tricky to keep up with picking out the clues from the correspondence through which the story ifs told.

The one glaring failing for me was the string of mispronunciations of words I would have expected a reader for Audible to be, or to make themselves, familiar with. If faced with an odd looking Scottish place name such as Kirkcudbright, I would find out how it’s locals referred to their home and not read it out loud as Kirk-cud-bright but as Kir-coo-bry; when referring to what might well be the name of a college of Cambridge university, I would research the name of Caius College (part of Gonville and Caius College), which is not pronounced Kie-us but Keys!

These were the most glaring mispronunciations, but there were unfortunately several more. The odd one could be smiled at, but I’m afraid it is a feature of this reader’s performance. Sorry if this seems harsh - I wait to hear of other readers’ reactions!

Shame about the performance.

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The plot of this novel emerges slowly from a wide ranging series of letters and witness accounts, crafted to characterise their writers' perspectives. With the right reader the twists and turns could be thought provoking and enjoyable. But this reader renders the whole thing somewhat turgid. Worth a listen, but I do wish an Ian Carmichael version was available!

Interesting epistolary novel, turgid reader

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If you are reading through all of the reviews, I'm presuming it's in the hope of deciding whether or not to pursue the purchase of this novel. My suggestion, is yes!

However, you have to do two things:-
1. Forget that this is a Dorothy Sayers novel. This should be easy enough to do because there is no Lord Peter Wimsey, or any of the characters One would associate with his novels.

2. Approach this as a new author's murder mystery novel that you are just embarking on. You will enjoy it immensely without the burden of thinking that this is not your usual Dorothy Sayers book.

The narrative and concept of this book is both original and extremely clever! The way that it is read is really easy to enjoy and immerse yourself in. At the beginning pay particular attention to the date, place & author of the first few letters, so that it becomes 2nd nature to do so!

You DO find out whodunit, eventually HOW it was done, but the brilliance of this novel is in the method of collating and presenting the evidence!

Many of the other reviewers absolutely adored this book, I am one of them. But there are a good few who did not enjoy it, and I sincerely believe that that is because this is not, absolutely NOT your usual Dorothy Sayers fare & they couldn't get their minds around this.

This is why I say, "Forget Dorothy Sayers and give this book a chance. You'll love it!"

A Perfect WhoDunnit!

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