I hadn’t expected something as playful as this. It’s mildly subversive in its way, pushing a little at the conventions of the genre. Vicky is a female Loki, a little goddess of mischief and chaos, The Prince is so over the top that he works. Emmy is a trouper in every sense. 

I think this would make a great stage play. It’s one step away from farce, the characters are larger than life and there are some fine set pieces.

And, good grief, I’m now a Georgette Hayer fan. My teenage self would never have predicted that.

Well, this rather improved on me quite a bit upon a reread! I still love the humor (for once, virtually without the sarcasm that is present in so many of Heyer's other books), Vicky and her mother are pure sparks of joy, and I even remembered the solution (though definitely not all the technical bits, which in fact I'm bound to have forgotten all over again by later today probably).  Now if only Heyer didn't have a penchant for making at least one part of the HEA element of the resolution feel quite so much like insta-love in practically every single one of her books ... (or, well, her mysteries, anyway).

I can see that I was set up to think well of Hemmingway by having the local Police Officer be such a dullard but I do enjoy his oblique approach to life.

I'm even starting to like Vicky Yes, she lives her life as if it were a Live Action Role Playing game but she is aware she's doing it.  She's beginning to seem more connected to real life than Mary.

I loved this exchange between the two of them where Vicky calls out Mary:

‘You know, Vicky,’ said Mary, ‘I’m absolutely horrified by the way you talk about your mother! It’s positively indecent.’

‘Dearest pet, the way I talk truly isn’t as indecent as the way you think,’ Vicky replied. ‘Because you’ve got the most degrading suspicions, and you disapprove of the poor sweet so much that you daren’t put it into words. I don’t disapprove of her at all; in fact, she has my vote.’

 

 

 

Although

I like Hemingway -good head on his shoulders and able to adapt quickly BUT the star is definitely Vicki. What a part that would be to play in a TV version of this.

I'm stopping now. I'll finish this in the morning.

It seems to me that Vicky*s Finishing School left her with no sense of reality at all. If this novel was set in modern times, she’d be putting the whole murder story on her instagram account along with a series selfies of her in each of her costumes.

i love this piece of dialogue where Vicky, speaking to Mary, says:

‘Which reminds me of what I actually came to talk to you about, Mary. Do you think considering everything, it might do good if we directed the Inspector’s attention to Alexis?’

*Do good?’ gasped Mary. ‘Do you mean, try and cast suspicion on the unfortunate man?’ ‘Yes, but in an utterly lady-like way.’ ‘No, I do not! I never heard of anything so – so conscienceless!’

‘But, darling, don’t be one of those irksome people who can’t look at a thing from more than one angle!.*

 

She makes the outrageously self-serving seem reasonable.

The inspector strikes me as remarkably dim. I like the humour it produces but I really hope someone this inflexible and so easily diverted would have this job.