“I don’t write problems,” said Royden, in rather too high a voice. “And enjoyment is the last thing I expect anyone to feel! If I’ve succeeded in making you think, I shall be satisfied.”
“A noble ideal,” commented Stephen. “But you shouldn’t say it as though you thought it unattainable. Not polite.”
Georgette Heyer’s agreement with the publishers of her mystery novels stipulated that she was to deliver a mystery/suspense novel to them once per year, a schedule she kept with admirable consistency until the outbreak of World War II. Stress over family members, in particular sorrow for a brother-in-law killed in the early years of the war, and fear for the safety of her husband, who had joined the Home Guard, made it difficult for her to write, or focus on something she found absolutely pointless under the circumstances. She procrastinated a bit with the escapist fluff The Corinthian, but she could make excuses for only so long, and eventually she returned to writing Envious Cascain slow bits and pieces. It was to be one of the grimmest yet best of her mystery novels.
[Spoilery, although again in following the dictates of Golden Age fiction, I try not to reveal the identity of the murder.]