Reading 1001 discussion

Of all the books in this series, so far, this is the most complex, I think. I like how Sayers somewhat maps her story against the structure of bell-ringing courses. In that way this book is similar to Carroll's Through the Looking Glass (which was mapped against a chess game). These sorts of meta-structures can be overdone and become a distraction, but in this case it worked quite well for adding extra emphasis to the way characters moved in and out of the story's focus as the novel progressed, the way the bells move their way through the sequence.
I also always like murder mysteries that focus on well-researched trivia topics, since I get to learn something while enjoying a fun bit of otherwise escapist reading. And, thanks to the Internet, I was able to find videos on youtube to listen to the various peals and watch bell-ringing teams at work in between chapters of this book. I can't say for sure till I finish the rest of the series, but this might be my favorite of the series. I of course gave it 5 stars on Goodreads.
I would add that this series can be read out of order, but there is character development in the main characters over the course of the series, that is missed if you read just one or two of them. The only titles on the List are Murder Must Advertise (book 10) and The Nine Tailors (book 11), but if you like murder mysteries, you might as well start from book 1 (Whose Body?) and work your way honestly to the Listed books.

3 stars

I love both mysteries, historical fiction and classics, yet I didn't engage very well with this book. I plan to try reading this one again at a later date as I am hopeful that it was just the time and place of this reading that kept me outside the story.

The Nine Tailors is a mystery novel which is the first in a series featuring Lord Peter Wimsley. The body of a man is found buried inside the plot of another and Wimsley must identify the man, and solve the events of his murder as well as find the culprit. At the same time he is solving a jewel heist.

I went into the book blind as I like to do so I had no idea that the book was about church bell ringers. The title is taken from history, where church bells were rung to announce deaths. The number of rings and the tones of the bells indicated the details such as gender and age. In this case the nine tailors indicated the death of a man.

I enjoyed the descriptions of village life and all the discussion of church bells. It felt very tangible. However the book felt very slow-paced and Wimsley seems to be much more passive than I would expect. I have read many other classic mystery novels and they often feel more fast-paced and action-packed. Even the Sherlock Holmes stories are more focused on what Holmes does to solve the crimes. Here it felt more like Wimsley sits back and expects the details to unfold themselves to him.

read 2014
Synopsis: This is a Lord Peter Wimsey mystery that takes place in the fens and involves bell changing (ringing) and has nothing to do with tailors.

I’ve read three Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries now and this is my favorite. I give in 4 stars for enjoyment but this is not a favorite for many and some feel the story is too slow. The details of the bells is a little complicated and probably results in people losing interest.

What I likes: I liked learning about the bells. I liked that the author seemed very knowledgeable about the subject of bell ringing. The story is set in the time period between the wars and mentions the influenza outbreak that did kill a lot of people. It touches on an environmental topic of what happens when man decides to change the course of nature. (draining the fen). The bells were used to announce a death. In these small communities people would no by the telling; thus the name “teller Paul” Paul being the largest (tenor) dedicated to St. Paul, and tailor being the dialect for teller.

The mystery and death is original. I am sure that is the reason that this was included in the 1001 books. It did win the Rusty Dagger award for best crime novel of the 1930s, British Crime Writers Association, 1999.

I also sometimes like a book because I like details about the author. Dorothy Sayer was the daughter of a Rector and grew up on the Fens at Blutisham. She was famous for being a playwright, writing Christian essay and she is mostly known for her status as one of the women mystery writers of the Golden Age. She started to translate Dante’s Divine Comedy and she considered it her best work but died before completion.

Read Jan 2020

I am quite sure I haven’t read this book before, but for the first quarter or so I felt like I had. I’m not sure if that is because she has been copied by/influenced other writers. Her style is quite different (in this novel at least) from her contemporary, Agatha Christie. Her approach is more academic in a way, referring to obscure campanology. Unfortunately, this detracted from the overall story for me. 3*

I really enjoyed this one and gave it 3 stars (more like 3.5 ish but decided to leave it at 3 because it was more casual enjoyment than awe). I agree it was written well and had some enjoyable twists of the variety that makes me enjoy murder mysteries in the first place. One thing I particularly loved was how the opening motif of the bells circles back to contribute to the climax of the plot. The bits of cultural history about the bells was enjoyable too.

However, while I liked the characters just fine I wasn’t extremely taken with them, and while I enjoyed the plot I wasn't extremely blown away by it. But, it was good and am interested in what her other list book is like.

I enjoyed this murder story that uses bell changing as a pattern for the book and as an integral part of the actual mystery. I did spend a great deal of time on the internet learning about bell changing although it was not at all required. The good characters are all charming as are the less good characters that we actually meet. Our sleuth is persistent and clever but not a genius by any means, and our police superintendent is a stickler for the law but good hearted. Overall it made for an entertaining read. I particularly enjoyed the plot complications and twists and also the fact that Sayers wove in the landscape of the fens themselves and their drainage system into the story. The bells and the drainage provided another level of characters into the mix.
I gave it 3.5/4

Set in rural England, there's a marvelous cast of well-developed supporting characters and an intricate plot involving theft and murder. Its not a fast read. This is a book that leads you slowly through the investigative process and along the way introduces the fascinating art of change ringing (set of actual church bells that are rang in a mathematical sequence) and gives a bit of an education into the drainage system that keep farmland lying below sea level dry. Have to admit that even though the answer was there, plainly written in the details, I didn't put it together until the book's hero, Lord Peter Wimsey, explained. Marvelously done.

Dorothy L. Sayers is probably my favourite mystery writer from the Golden Age, and I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The setting was a rural village in the Fens and the mystery centred around the church and its bells, with a body being found in a grave in the churchyard and Lord Peter Wimsey investigating.

It is a rather slow moving book at first, but it builds up to a really startling and memorable conclusion, and is pretty entertaining throughout. I was totally immersed in the time and place and enjoyed the intelligence and intricacy of the plot.

I highly recommend this audiobook - the sonorous reading added depth, even empathy to the satire and dark humor. I read this in 2018 (I can see from my library history) when I read through the whole lot of the Wimsey tales, but not having a memory of any one in particular except the advertising one, and trying to catch up my boxall list which singles this and the advertising one out, and looking for some solid entertaining distraction this past week, this seemed the perfect commuting pick. And it is pretty great. Nine tailors - the bell rung to notify the town of the passing of a man - "is the measure of a man." In the guise of an entertaining crime story, Sayers gives us portraits of honorable and not so honorable men - and takes their measure.

Reading other's reviews and my own copied above, I think part of the problem is the false advertising of the expectation of a mystery story in the traditional sense. This is a morality play, with lots of people behaving well and lots of people behaving badly, and the bells bringing about "justice" in a sort of god-like way with the typical mixed outcomes of fate. Wimsey at one point about three quarters through actually says its too bad they got all mucked up in trying to solve things, that trying to do good is causing worse things to happen. I think it is for the moral complexity that it is on the list.

Pre-2016 review:

*** 1/2

When I saw the title of this novel, I was expecting (and maybe dreading a little) a mystery focusing on mercers and fashion designers. I was so wrong. The Nine Tailors delves into campanology, the art and science of bell-ringing; it refers to the peals rung on funerals and prefaces well a murder mystery. As my second Sayers/Lord Wimsey, this was much better than Murder Must Advertise. The characters, set in Fen country, were a lot more picturesque and interesting than the copywriters of MMA. The plot and mystery were more intricate, less predictable. And the details on campanology, even though quite obscure, provide a very clever theme around which the plot is woven.