The Attenbury Emeralds

Author(s): Jill Paton Walsh

Fiction - Crime & Thriller

In 1936, Dorothy L. Sayers abandoned the last Lord Peter Wimsey detective story. Sixty years later, a brown paper parcel containing a copy of the manuscript was discovered in her agent's safe in London, and award-winning novelist Jill Paton Walsh was commissioned to complete it. The result of the pairing of Dorothy L. Sayers with Walsh was the international bestseller "Thrones, Dominations.


"Now, following "A Presumption of Death," set during World War II, comes a new Sayers-inspired mystery featuring Lord Peter Wimsey, revisiting his very first case. . . . It was 1921 when Lord Peter Wimsey first encountered the Attenbury Emeralds. The recovery of the gems in Lord Attenbury's dazzling heirloom collection made headlines--and launched a shell-shocked young aristocrat on his career as a detective.


Thirty years later, a happily married Lord Peter has just shared the secrets of that mystery with his wife, the detective novelist Harriet Vane. Suddenly, the new Lord Attenbury--grandson of Lord Peter's first client--seeks his help to prove who owns the emeralds. As Harriet and Peter contemplate the changes that the war has wrought on English society--and Peter, who always cherished the liberties of a younger son, faces the unwanted prospect of ending up the Duke of Denver after all--Jill Paton Walsh brings us a masterful new chapter in the annals of one of the greatest detectives of all time.

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'Sayers's fans won't be disappointed, and newcomers are in for a treat' -- Laura Wilson, Guardian 20101023 'Sayers would not have recognised that it wasn't her own work.' -- Marcel Berlins, The Times 20101016 'A great deal of fun.' -- Natasha Cooper TLS 20101015 'An absolute treat: civilised, intelligent and spellbinding...' -- Barry Forshaw, Daily Express 20100917 'A pitch-perfect Golden Age mystery; not a pastiche but a gem of a period puzzle that belongs on the shelf beside the Wimsey originals.' -- Christopher Fowler, Financial Times 20100917 'An enjoyable and clever concoction ... a good puzzle ... skilled portrait of the austere postwar world.' -- Jessica Mann, Literary Review 20100910 'Wit, worldly wisdom and literary jokes ... As a Peter Wimsey story, it should give unalloyed pleasure to Sayers' fans: and simply in its own right as a novel, it makes joyous light reading.' -- Anthony Lejeune, Tablet 20110101

Jill Paton Walsh, born in 1937, is also the author of many non-crime novels for adults: the fourth of these, Knowledge of Angels, was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. Before writing for adults she made a career as a writer of children's books and has won many literary prizes.

General Fields

  • : 9780340995747
  • : Hodder & Stoughton
  • : Hodder Paperback
  • : 0.24
  • : 01 May 2011
  • : 198mm X 130mm X 23mm
  • : 01 July 2011
  • : books

Special Fields

  • : FF
  • : 338
  • : 823.914
  • : en
  • : 11-Jul
  • : Paperback
  • : Jill Paton Walsh