Lord Peter Wimsey: The final book?
So, for the longest time, I included Thrones, Dominations in my mental and emotional classification as “canon Lord Peter novels”. There’s enough Sayers in it (mostly the amazing opening and the first half of the book) that it feels real to me. However, the second half has always been a pale, pale imitation of Strong Poison, with so many cheap fanfictional tropes that as JPW has continued to “add” books to the series, I’m less and less inclined to truly count it. (And there’s the fact that Sayers beautifully bookends the whole series from Whose Body to Busman’s Honeymoon by having Lord Peter’s first and last recorded lines be “Oh, damn”. That kind of artistry can’t be discarded!)
So, I think at this point, I’ll regard Thrones, Dominations as a lovely fragment, and I’m grateful for JPW and the publishers for at least publishing what we got - that much Sayers is still worthwhile, even with the tacked on stuff. But I don’t think I’ll regard it as the “last book” in the series anymore.
