The Attenbury emeralds : the new Lord Peter Wimsey/Harriet Vane mystery /

*Starred Review* It is a dangerous thing to bring characters so distinctive and beloved as Dorothy Sayers' Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane into a new age, but Walsh manages it as she did in A Presumption of Death (2002), with delicacy and precision. Post-WWII England remains under rationing and economically troubled. Wimsey, at 60, is settled comfortably. Harriet is writing. Their three boys are at school along with Bunter and his photographer wife's boy. Peter and Bunter recount to Harriet the tale of Peter's very first case, the (missing) emeralds of the title, a rich and exotic story. What this allows Walsh to do is show how the characters have moved into a postwar and modern sensibility, elegantly extrapolating how Peter and Harriet would think and act. She marries this with the ping-pong of quotations and kernels of fact to which fans are accustomed. Just when one might think the tale will be elegiac and ruminating, it ramps up deliciously when the current Attenbury again seeks Wimsey's aid in tracking an elusive emerald, one of three. There are murders, intrigue, and a family tragedy, and Peter and Harriet find themselves in a very different place in 1952. Small delights include glimpses of the three Wimsey sons, all bright and beautiful, and the loyal Bunter moving with changing mores but steadfast affection.--DeCandido, GraceAnne A. Copyright 2010 Booklist

Walsh's interpretation of the classic characters of Dorothy L. Sayers labors under a somewhat lukewarm performance from narrator Edward Petherbridge. Decades after the fact, legendary sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey-along with his wife, novelist Harriet Vane, and his faithful manservant Bunter-looks back on his first case: retrieving missing emeralds belonging to the Attenbury family while recovering from shell shock after WWI. Petherbridge's narration is steady and clear but tends to plod. While he provides excellent voices for Wimsey (soft-spoken, aristocratic, playful, and genteel) and Bunter (slightly twangy, dignified, and the very soul of deference) and cultivates an enjoyable chemistry between the married Wimsey and Vane, Petherbridge could better distinguish the book's other characters, many of which sound vaguely familiar and blend into each other. A Minotaur hardcover. (Mar.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

This is Walsh's third venture into writing in the Lord Peter Wimsey/Harriet Vane universe created by Dorothy L. Sayers. Her first, Thrones, Dominations, completed an unfinished Sayers's novel, based on notes. Her second, A Presumption of Death, was based on a series of Sayers's articles known as "The Wimsey Papers." This new title is the first to bear only Walsh's name as author, although the eponymous case was referred to many times throughout Sayers's novels as Peter's first case. This novel will satisfy fans of Wimsey, in its flashback to his beginnings as an amateur sleuth and with its "flashforward" glimpses into the happily married lives of an older Peter and Harriet, their children, and the family of Mervyn Bunter, the Jeeves to Peter's Wooster. Some of the self-referential jokes may be off-putting to some readers. As capably as Walsh writes, it still misses the spark that Sayers brought to the originals. Verdict Recommended for longtime devotees of Sayers and the witty detective genre but not the way to introduce a new reader to the series. [Library marketing.]-Amy Watts, Univ. of Georgia Lib., Athens (c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Walsh returns with a mystery based on characters created by British crime writer Dorothy L. Sayers (18931957).The former Harriet Vane, reading the obituary of Lord Attenbury, asks her husband, Lord Peter Wimsey, about his first case, finding the lost Attenbury emeralds. With help from his man Bunter, Wimsey recounts the tale of the missing gems, part of a set once owned by the Maharaja of Sinorabad, which disappeared back in the '20s at the engagement party of Attenbury's daughter. Oddly enough, during the dark days of World War II, the treasure goes missing again, and it is up to Lord Peter, relying on Bunter as his sounding board, to find it once more. His task will endanger several others, including a Persian scholar, and stymie an insurance payout until the emeralds can be rightly identified. The final disposition of the emeralds occurs while the Wimseys grapple with a fire and a death that force them to reconsider longstanding family roles.Walsh (A Presumption of Death,2003, etc.) delicately balances the mainstays of Sayers' fictiondrawing rooms, servants, a coolly elegant sleuthwith more contemporary touches. Readers will find a nod to cerebral charm, with a touch of modern egalitarianism.]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.