Gaudy Night [SEP] series
Gaudy Night
Gaudy Night (1935) is a mystery novel by Dorothy L. Sayers, the tenth featuring Lord Peter Wimsey, and the third including Harriet Vane.
The dons of Harriet Vane's "alma mater", the all-female Shrewsbury College, Oxford (based on Sayers' own Somerville College), have invited her back to attend the annual Gaudy celebrations. However, the mood turns sour when someone begins a series of malicious acts including poison-pen messages, obscene graffiti and wanton vandalism. Harriet asks
[t]his detective novel is much more than interesting. The numerous characters are well differentiated, and include one of the most feckless, exasperating and lifelike literary men that ever confused a trail." Hay's second novel, "Death on the Cherwell", appeared in the same year as Sayers' "Gaudy Night" and, like "Gaudy Night", was set in a women's college at Oxford.
The three novels were reprinted in 2013-14 in the "British Library Crime Classics" series.