Dorothy L. Sayers initially intended to end her Lord Peter Wimsey series of mystery novels with Gaudy Night, in which Harriet Vane finally succumbs to Peter’s charm and agrees to marry him. But later she collaborated with Muriel St. Clare Byrne on a Wimsey play, called Busman’s Honeymoon. In the play, the honeymoon is interrupted by the discovery of a murdered body, to the couple’s frustration and some interesting character revelation.
Later Sayers turned the play into a novel. It’s not considered one of the best of the series, but it has virtues that make it well worth reading.
The story opens with a series of letters written by various characters, describing the wedding and its initial aftermath. Harriet has confided to Peter’s mother that she always wanted to live in a particular house she used to visit as a child, in a village in Hertfordshire. Peter has delightedly bought it for her, and he and his man Bunter have arranged for the house to be ready for their occupation when they show up on the wedding night.
However, they find the house locked and uninhabited, and none of the servants were expecting them. At last they get in, make shift to set up in spite of inconveniences like blocked chimneys, and consummate their marriage. The next morning the missing former owner is found – bludgeoned to death in the cellar.
The local police superintendent takes to Wimsey immediately, being, like him, devoted to collecting literary allusions for insertion into conversation. Lord Peter can’t resist involving himself in the mystery. They will encounter a collection of local eccentrics, all with various motives for wanting the victim dead, but with either insufficient motivations or solid alibis. The final solution will prove to involve a genuine scoundrel and a baffling murder weapon.
The story gets slow in some stretches, especially in what I assume (it’s been a while since I read it) the added scenes not found in the play. The great virtue of the book, in my opinion, is the section at the end where Peter suffers a PTSD reaction as the murderer’s execution hour approaches, and Harriet comforts him.
Recommended. I also think some Christian college ought to stage the original play some time. I wish I’d gotten the chance to play Lord Peter when I was young and thin.