In the Teeth of the Evidence

This was actually such a great collection of short stories, although if you're going into it expecting much of Lord Peter Wimsey, you'd be pretty disappointed. Our affable Lord Peter only appears in a grand total of 2 out of 17 short stories. Nevertheless, I thoroughly enjoyed most of these stories and they all offer something new and refreshing. Might I even say that I enjoy these short stories a bit more than the iconic Agatha Christie's collections, if only because Sayers's mysteries aren't quite as formulaic?

Every title in this one offers something different to remember them by, and they don't all blend together, which is already saying a lot. The titular “In The Teeth of Evidence” and “Absolutely Elsewhere” are the two that feature Lord Peter Wimsey, and are perhaps the most conventional murder mystery type of short stories.

Then, we have several short stories featuring a character I've never heard of before, Montague Egg. He's apparently some kind of traveling salesman (also called “commercial gentleman” or “travellers”, facts I learned from this book) peddling the wares of a liquor company. He finds himself getting into all kinds of scrapes and, for some reason, being trusted enough by the police to be let in on the investigation for crimes. He helps them out by referring to The Salesman's Handbook, which offers a lot of quotable quotes presumably for salesmen to do their jobs but which also somehow becomes apt for crimefighting. I was at first not very interested in another “detective” other than Wimsey, but then grew to really enjoy the voice of Monty Egg and the quirky way he quotes his Handbook at every turn.

Both Wimsey and Egg stories take up only half the short stories in this book. The rest are ones that don't have a detective per se, and are just standalone mysteries or just highly interesting/mysterious incidents which were all pretty entertaining to read.

Overall, this book was such a great comfort read for me and was fantastic for me to read and relax with on a lazy weekend afternoon. If you like cozy mysteries, this is a great collection to try out, even if you have no previous experience with Dorothy Sayers and Lord Peter Wimsey.