WTF (to the power n)

[nineveh_uk]

Courtesy of http://eurocrime.blogspot.com/2009/04/new-peter-wimsey-novel.html

***

New Peter Wimsey novel

Jill Paton Walsh mentioned to this at last year's Harrogate Crime Writer's Festival - that she was working on a third Wimsey novel. The news is confirmed today at BookBrunch, though the finished result won't be available until autumn 2010:

"Hodder has bought THE ATTENBURY EMERALDS, Jill Paton Walsh’s third Lord Peter Wimsey novel, from Bruce Hunter of David Higham Associates on behalf of the estate of Dorothy L Sayers. The story is set after World War II, but its roots go back to 1921 and Lord Peter Wimsey’s first case, in which the Attenbury Emeralds were stolen – a mystery alluded to by Sayers in a number of novels but never resolved.

The Sayers’ trustees asked Paton Walsh, who was shortlisted for the Booker Prize for her novel Knowledge of Angels, to complete an unfinished Sayers’ story, Thrones, Dominations, which had been found in the offices of her agent. It was published in 1998 to considerable acclaim, and was a Sunday Times bestseller. Like that novel, The Attenbury Emeralds will follow closely Sayers’ own writing about Lord Peter Wimsey, as told in her 11 novels and five collections of short stories. Publication is scheduled for autumn 2010."

As well as completing Thrones, Dominations, Walsh also wrote A Presumption of Death which was based on Dorothy L Sayers' letters.

***

I need to go home and see _exactly_ what Sayers wrote about the Attenbury Emeralds, and Peter's activities in 1921. I doubt that it will encourage me. I can just see the contrast between nice "Let's make Peter secretly middle class" domestic life with Harriet and the boys (who will of course be at the local grammar school rather than Eton) and nihilistic mistress-keeping in Paris. Hopefully there will be lots of Parker. JPW seems to do him a bit better - possibly because he is already conventional and middle-class.

But yes, of course I'm going to buy the book. I won't like it, but I'll still have to buy it.

Comments

[aella_irene]

I am fighting the urge to mutter loudly that an assassination would be beneficial to the literary world as a whole- mostly because I don't know any assassins. At least, as far as I am aware.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Maybe if you mutter loudly about needing an assassin, an assassin that you don't know you know will put him/herself forward?

[rosathome.livejournal.com]

When they say 'considerable acclaim', I assume they mean 'from those with a vested interest in the book's success'.

And yes, I'll probably feel compelled to buy it and read it and wince my way through it too.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

When they say 'considerable acclaim', I assume they mean 'from those with a vested interest in the book's success'.

Well, yes. Whilst other Wimsey fans desperately hope that the present 'owner' of the Estate dies before all the uncatalogued real stuff rots.

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

Adaese sayas, "Would she like to tell us the story of the giant rat of Sumatra while she's at it?"

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I thought that had now been found (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7149569.stm)?

Tho' being eaten by giant rats might be a better fate than what awaits...

[tree_and_leaf]

DO NOT WANT.

(Except, damn it, I will almost certainly end up buying it). Why can't she write more Imogen Quy, instead? I quite like I.Q., and it doesn't involve stomping on things dear to my heart. And if the publishers must commission Wimsey fanfic, why can't they commission someone who's better at it?

[fallingtowers.livejournal.com]

And if the publishers must commission Wimsey fanfic, why can't they commission someone who's better at it?

I'd nominate Nineveh in a heartbeat. Who's with me? :)

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I've never actually read I.Q., but part of that may be prejudice after my father (who has enjoyed other books by JPW) read one and went off on a huge rant about its politics and ethics that rather put me off! Every so often I intend to get one from the library, but I haven't quite managed it.

[fallingtowers.livejournal.com]

But yes, of course I'm going to buy the book. I won't like it, but I'll still have to buy it.

:)

Yes. This. I got rid of my copies of Thrones, Dominations and whatever the second one was called a while ago, but I just KNOW that I won't be able to resist The Attenbury Emeralds. Damn.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

It's the dreadful "I know it will infuriate me, and yet I can't help needing to read it" feeling. The literary equivalent of picking scabs.

[ellid.livejournal.com]

I didn't have the money to buy Thrones, Dominations, but what I read in the bookstore did not impress.

[missfoxie.livejournal.com]

Oh BUGGER.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Indeed...

[azdak.livejournal.com]

I haven't even read Presumption of Death *looks smug*. I thought Thrones, Dominations was already so far from the path of One True Sayersness that I haven't been even remotely tempted to read any further offerings (although I hasten to add that I have read other novels by Paton Walsh and think that she is an excellent writer. But not of things Wimsical.)

I would like to sign the Petition to Employ Nineveh to Write Any Further Sequels. Where can i find it?

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

I confess I quite enjoyes Thrones, Dominations; but then it was the first Sayers I had read.

[gramarye1971]

*sigh* I thought we'd done with this. Ah, well. Can't say I'll be buying it myself -- I'll just wait and read the complaints. ^^;;

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

That may be the most enjoyable option!

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

I share your sentiments. Though my plan is to wait until everyone who has HAD to buy it sells/dumps it in post-FakeWimsey regret, and get a copy that way.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

A cunning plan. I have no choice but to buy it, because I am weak-willed and will otherwise read all the good bits in the bookshop.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Money?

[adina-atl.livejournal.com]

It's going to be weird for me reading about the Attenbury emeralds after writing "Green Ice." But, but, but that's not the way it happened! *grin*

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

The first comment on the LordPeter list was "Bet it won't be as good as Green Ice"! Which I heartily second.

[el-staplador.livejournal.com]

*wails and gnashes teeth*

I must confess that I did like Hope Fanshawe. Just not as a potential other half for Bunter.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Hope could have been interested - I'd even have accepted her as a friend of Bunter's he was helping out with photography and other people speculating about a romance. But we _know_ where Bunter's heart lies!

[threerings.livejournal.com]

I still haven't read the second JPW novel, I think mostly based on your warning not to. And I barely remember Thrones, Dominations at all. I think I keep blocking it out.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I really hate the second one, not just for its Sayers elements, but because of its failure (in my mind) at the WWII elements as well!

[owl]

I won't like it, but I'll still have to buy it.

Therein lies the problem. Sigh.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I know. It's the closest I get to addictive compulsion!

[marginaliana]

I haven't read either of her Wimsey novels so far, but I expect I probably will get around to it before this new one comes out, just to see what I'm getting into. SIgh.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I beg of you, get them from the library...

[parelle.livejournal.com]

Oh goodness. Ick, ick. DO NOT WANT.