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#LordPeter
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ImperfectCJ
Gaudy Night | Dorothy L. Sayers
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I couldn't limit myself to just three favorites! There were a few books in the list I hadn't read, but I'd read others by the authors (I didn't count them, nor did I count movies).

Thanks for the tag, @dabbe ! #TLT #ThreeListThursday

dabbe #woohooyou! The only one I've read of your choices is REBECCA. Got the others now on the TBR! Thanks for playing and sharing! 🖤🎃🖤 1w
30 likes1 comment
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ImperfectCJ
Have His Carcase | Dorothy L. Sayers
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Mehso-so

Sayers has a tendency to have her characters (usually Lord Peter) make a point with a very large number of words. Usually, I like this, but in this novel, it feels tedious. This novel has a seemingly complex mystery with a relatively simple solution that's revealed fairly excruciatingly right before the novel abruptly ends. I wonder what was going on in Sayers's life when she wrote this one because it seems like she wasn't really focused on it.

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ImperfectCJ
Have His Carcase | Dorothy L. Sayers
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I've had an emotional week (nothing too awful, just feeling overwhelmed due to a malfunction with my empathy filter), which was punctuated this afternoon by a cathartic crying jag triggered by seeing a racoon family that hadn't made it safely across the road. How murder mysteries became comfort reading for me, I have no idea, but here we are. Hopefully, I can find better emotional balance soon. Until then, hooray for escapism!

Jas16 Glad you found a form of escapism that works for you. Sending ❤️ 2mo
Ruthiella I find reading and rereading Agatha Christie soothing. Hope next week is better. ❤️ 2mo
Faranae If it's mysteries like Sayers, then Golden Age mysteries present a terrible thing happening without too much gruesome detail, with a promise that justice will be achieved by the end. It's not so very different from romance in a way, in that there's an implicit contract with the reader. 2mo
48 likes3 comments
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ImperfectCJ
The Five Red Herrings | Dorothy L. Sayers
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I have to leave for a coffee date I've been looking forward to, but Wimsey is just about to do the Big Reveal! This is why I wish I lived somewhere with better public transit.

IndoorDame Great mug! 3mo
TheBookgeekFrau That mug!😍😍😍 3mo
BarbaraJean I hate having to put down a book right before the Big Reveal!! And I also love your mug. 😊 3mo
ImperfectCJ @IndoorDame @TheBookgeekFrau @BarbaraJean Thanks! We got it from a local artist. It was originally my spouse's mug, but I kind of took it over 3mo
38 likes4 comments
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ImperfectCJ
The Five Red Herrings | Dorothy L. Sayers
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Okay, so this book just had a scene in which the characters have a detailed conversation about which trains and buses are best to take, and now I keep picturing the characters as the cast of SNL's The Californians.

LiteraryinPA Yesssssss 4mo
37 likes1 comment
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ImperfectCJ
The Five Red Herrings | Dorothy L. Sayers
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Time notation in this novel is different than I've seen it before. I've been able to find an explanation for "point format" (using a point rather than a colon between the hour and minute), but I'm not sure about the absence of the zero before a single-digit minute (1.7 vs 1.07). My hypothesis: That the zero as a placeholder is an addition that came about after digital clocks were introduced.

Does anyone have insight into this history?

ImperfectCJ @TieDyeDude Hmm...this makes sense for a timecard where you're measuring amounts of time, but I don't think in the context of the time-telling usage in this pre-WWII novel (e.g., in dialogue and in train time tables), the decimal point as representing a portion of an hour works. Of course, I might be reading it wrong, but I'm reading 1.7 pm as "one-seven p.m.", similar to 1:07 (one-o-seven p.m.) 4mo
ImperfectCJ I got my info about point notation from Wikipedia, but no light shed on the lack of a zero before a single-digit minute: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Date_and_time_notation_in_the_United_Kingdom 4mo
See All 9 Comments
TieDyeDude Ah, yeah, I was just looking at 1.7, but 1.48 seems overly complicated for measuring amounts of time. I can't really find anything else. I'd be curious if the print version of the book has the same notation... 4mo
ImperfectCJ @TieDyeDude Style guides online for various UK entities (Oxford University Press, The Times, The Guardian) use the point format for the 12-hour clock (i.e., 1.48 pm), so I feel confident that the overall format is a UK thing, but that lack of a first zero is still a mystery. I suppose my initial hypothesis still stands, but I'd love actual evidence rather than just not having it proven wrong 4mo
TieDyeDude 😁 🔎🧩 4mo
julesG I agree with your hypothesis about it being pre-digital clocks. 4mo
Faranae I've been looking through compositor's manuals, but I can't find any that deal with time tables or schedules. I know the point format has been in use in the UK since at least the 1840s (since that's the oldest compositor's manual I looked at) but none of them omit mentioning the 0s. On the other hand, decimilising time would be a very French Revolutionary thing to do, so even more unlikely (and really, really impractical). 4mo
Faranae Having found the original print edition in PDF, I still don't know if it's *standard* or just how the character chooses to write the times, but in context it's fairly clear on the printed page that it's what we'd write as 1:07 4mo
39 likes9 comments
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ImperfectCJ
The Five Red Herrings | Dorothy L. Sayers
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While it was pleasant to spend a couple of days with Netflix true crime shows, I am very glad that I have enough energy and focus to read a bit today! Although I'd read that the more recent strains aren't supposed to mess with your sense of smell as much, I'm definitely not able to smell or taste like usual. But with a teen just back from sleepaway camp, maybe it's not all bad that my sense of smell is diminished. 😂

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BarbaraJean
Busman's Honeymoon | Dorothy L. Sayers
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Pickpick

In some ways I was hesitant to read this, partly because Gaudy Night was SO GOOD and I was worried this wouldn‘t measure up, and partly because this is the last book and I don‘t want the series to be over. I needn‘t have worried about it not measuring up. Sayers manages to weave together and balance the Harriet & Peter bits with the mystery bits perfectly. And the ending hit me hard—instead of solving the crime and wrapping it up nice and pat⤵️

BarbaraJean (Cont‘d) …it actually deals with the aftermath. I must now go back and read these all again. But first I‘ll be checking out the BBC adaptations from the 70s! 4mo
Leftcoastzen Nice collection! 4mo
BarbaraJean @Leftcoastzen Thank you! Most are from my local library book sale! 4mo
42 likes3 comments
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ImperfectCJ
The Five Red Herrings | Dorothy L. Sayers
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Home from traveling and at the hair salon getting the boy-teen cleaned up for camp and a really cool musical performance opportunity that came up for him. This is such a busy summer, just one thing after the next! It's nice but tiring.

In other news: The dialect in this novel is really slowing me down. The interactions are clearly funny, but I feel like the sloth from Zootopia with how long it takes me to get the jokes.

46 likes1 stack add
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ImperfectCJ
The Five Red Herrings | Dorothy L. Sayers
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Travel day! Spent the 5+ hours on the plane trying to nap then giving up and watching Amelie, and now I'm trying to get some reading in on the hour-long train ride. The train is not nearly as air conditioned as I expected it to be. 🥵

ImperfectCJ Update: Between the swaying, the jerky stops and starts, and the heat, I couldn't read on the train without feeling ill. One last chance before bed! 4mo
51 likes1 comment