From the back cover:
The stark naked body was lying in the tub. Not unusual for a proper bath, but highly irregular for murder—especially with a pair of gold pince-nez deliberately perched before the sightless eyes. What’s more, the face appeared to have been shaved after death. The police assumed that the victim was a prominent financier, but Lord Peter Wimsey, who dabbled in mystery detection as a hobby, knew better. In this, his first murder case, Lord Peter untangles the ghastly mystery of the corpse in the bath.
Review:
This is a reread of a book I last read in 2002 and, for some reason, did not enjoy particularly much at the time. I liked it quite well this time around, I’m glad to say, even though I still remembered the identity of the culprit and found the mystery itself to not be as interesting as Lord Peter and his cautious friend from the Yard, Parker.
I particularly liked a conversation between the two of them regarding Peter’s view of detection as a game, at which he feels he ought to be sporting and congratulate his quarry (once caught) on providing good chase rather than be the instrument of their apprehension and subsequent punishment.
Whose Body? was as far as I got in 2002, and this solid start leaves me happily anticipating continuing on into uncharted territory.
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