Joyce Lemprière/Joan West is the wife of Raymond West. She had been to Rathole during the events of the short story The Blood-Stained Pavement.
In The Thirteen Problems, she is described as having a "close-cropped black head and queer hazel-green eyes". She comes up with the idea of forming The Tuesday Night Club, where every week, one of the members has to present a problem, for the others to solve. She believes that she will be better than the others at solving mysteries because as an artist, she sees things that others do not, and has "knocked about among all sorts and conditions of people".
During one of the meetings of The Tuesday Night Club, Joyce calls Miss Marple "Aunt Jane", and claims that she does not know why she does it. It is later revealed that earlier that evening, Raymond had asked Joyce to marry him.
She is mentioned in At Bertram's Hotel, although here she is called Joan. Miss Marple tells Lady Selina Hazy that Joan is quite a well-known painter, and had an exhibition not long ago. Joan had offered Miss Marple a stay at one of Bournemouth's best hotels, thinking that it would be good for her to get away from home for a change. However, Miss Marple wanted to stay at Bertram's Hotel, so Joan arranged for her to stay there instead.
Naming problem[]
In the initial short stories (collected in The Thirteen Problems) she is called Joyce, but in Sleeping Murder she is called Joan.