A Presumption of Death A Presumption of Death A Presumption of Death is a Lord Peter Wimsey-Harriet Vane mystery novel by Jill Paton Walsh, based loosely on "The Wimsey Papers" by Dorothy L. Sayers. The novel is Walsh's first original Lord Peter Wimsey novel, following "Thrones, Dominations", which Sayers left as an unfinished manuscript, and was completed by Walsh. "A Presumption of Death" is written by Walsh, except for excerpts from "The Wimsey Papers". Harriet, Lady Peter Wimsey, has evacuated her family to the Wimseys' country house, Talboys in Hertfordshire, taking her two children, along with the three children of her sister-in-law, Lady Mary,
Lord Peter Views the Body Lord Peter Views the Body Lord Peter Views the Body, first published in 1928, was the first collection of short stories about Lord Peter Wimsey by Dorothy L. Sayers. All of them were included in later complete collections, although some of these early works are generally considered to be below par. It is sometimes forgotten that the 'Golden Age' of book-length detective stories and thrillers between the Wars overlapped with and emerged from the previous era of the short magazine story, typified by Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories (the last collection of which was published in 1927, a year before