Growing up, I was a huge fan of Agatha Christie and Rex Stout. I'd mix things up a little with the occasional Ngaio Marsh, Ruth Rendell, or Erle Stanley Gardner mystery, but I never looked into Dorothy L. Sayers until recently. Sayers was a contemporary of Christie's and was one of the first women ever to earn a degree from Oxford. Later in her life she became a noted Christian scholar, but most of her literary fame derives from her detective stories featuring Lord Peter Wimsey. Wimsey was atypical of the sleuths of fiction from the time period. He didn't bask in his eccentricities like Poirot or Nero Wolfe. Instead, he was a wealthy aristocrat with excellent social connections and a real talent for sport.
Murder Must Advertise, published in 1933, is set at the firm of Pym's Publicity. Sayers worked in an advertising firm and her behind-the-scenes knowledge is well evident. In this story, Wimsey goes undercover at Pym's to discover who pushed one of the associates down a spiral staircase and what London's thriving drug trade has to do with Pym's. While not as ingenious a plotter as Christie, Sayers writing is breezy and lighthearted. There is a great deal of humor in the characters and the dialog and contains some broad and affectionate swipes at English class hangups and character.
If you're an English mystery fan, you'll enjoy this book. Next on my list from Sayers is Five Red Herrings, which most mystery enthusiasts claim as her best.
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