P.G. Wodehouse Books

Wodehouse is an unfailing master. I don't think I've ever been disappointed by anything he's ever written. Disappointingly, I won't give a plot summary here, for that I refer to the other reviewer.

However, for the die-hard Wodehouse fans like myself, be aware that this book is also known as "Girls, Pearls & Monty Bodkin." So, if you already own the latter novel, you own this one, as well.

The world of P.G. Wodehouse is filled with fat-headed aristocrats, grubby social climbers with money, and crooks who would like to relieve both of their excess funds and goods against the backdrop of a romance that is in difficulty. Eventually, love conquers all with much good fun along the way. The Plot That Thickened is a fine outing in that famous formula.

I divide all P.G. Wodehouse comic novels into two categories: Those with Jeeves (the all-knowing and ever-helpful butler) and those without Jeeves. Jeeves is one of the great comic characters in English literature, and I miss him when he's not around. The Plot That Thickened is without Jeeves.

Monty Bodkin, one of the two solvent members of the disreputable Drones Club in London, has fallen in love with Ms. Gertrude Butterwick, a hefty young lady who played for the All England women's field hockey team. Gertrude's father doesn't approve of Monty, seeing his as a useless wastrel, and puts a condition on the engagement. There will be no marriage until Monty has completed one year of a paying job.

As the book opens, Monty has just completed this task pretty pleasantly by becoming an advisor to a motion picture studio in Hollywood, after he helps the head of the studio, one Ivor Llewellyn, smuggle some jewelry after a transatlantic crossing. He spends his days doing very little, attended by his charming secretary, Sandy Miller, who's fallen in love with Monty . . . a fact he's totally missed.

Monty heads back to Jolly Old England to claim the girl . . . only to find that old Butterworth has found out about how Monty got the job from a letter Monty sent to Gertrude. Butterworth tells Monty his year in Hollywood doesn't count. Sandy follows Monty to London where they meet by chance, and Sandy offers to help him get a job as the studio mogul's secretary while the mogul writes a book.

How will love conquer all? Well, not without complications. It turns out that the mogul's wife hires a crook to protect her prize possession, a string of peerless pearls that she's keeping for her daughter's marriage. The daughter, Mavis, is a real tigress and decides that Monty is a crook who wants to steal the pearls. Mrs. Llewellen further complicates matters by inviting a pair of crooks to be house guests. What will happen to those pearls?

If you would like to read a book that gives you a new smile or laugh on almost every page, The Plot That Thickened is a fine choice.

Have you ever found yourself beset by rules that you couldn't seem to follow without breaking some other rule (sort of like Catch-22)? How did you extract yourself? How can you avoid getting into a situation like that in the future?

Sometimes when you read a novel, you want a searing look at the human condition or a sprawling epic crossing generations. At other times, you want complete fluff, light entertainment that makes you feel good while offering little real substance. In this field of whimsical words, few can outshine P.G. Wodehouse, and rarely is Wodehouse better than when he writes of Bertie Wooster, the dim but well-meaning member of the idle rich, and his omniscient valet Jeeves.

Ring for Jeeves is the only Jeeves and Wooster story without Bertie (who is off getting an education in independence and is only referred to occasionally). Instead, Jeeves is temporarily attending to William Belfry, a poor member of the nobility who has landed himself in the soup. In an effort to raise funds to properly marry his fiancée Jill, he has adopted a second identity as a bookie; this works great until an erstwhile great white hunter Biggar wins a long shot; Bill welshes on the bet (intending to pay when he has the funds) and flees to his estate, Biggar in hot pursuit.

There is hope, however, with a beautiful, wealthy widow who wants to buy the estate and give Bill more than enough money. But with this hope comes complications. She is secretly in love with Biggar, who is in turn secretly in love with her; as he is also impoverished, he feels it wrong to marry her when it would be assumed he was after her money. She is also Bill's ex-lover, causing a potential rift with Jill. There are also complications regarding a diamond pendant and an upcoming horse race. In the middle of all this is Jeeves, the calm port in the storm of troubles, who offers various solutions, some of which are more effective than others.

This is in many ways an atypical novel, hampered by Bertie's absence. Told in the third person instead of with Bertie's usually delightful narration, something is lost. In addition, Jeeves is at his best when he is at his most all-knowing; here, he seems less brilliant than usual, although still clever enough. These problems are sufficient to reduce this to a four-star effort. This is still a good book, but not a good introduction to Wodehouse or the Jeeves & Wooster stories; I recommend reading others in the series first (such as Right Ho, Jeeves; Carry On, Jeeves or Thank You, Jeeves).

I concur with mrliteral (below) that this isn't top-tier Jeeves, due to his estrangement from Bertie in this tale. It's full of the typical Wodehousery and wordplay, and you're sure to enjoy, but it's not quite up to the heights of the very best. Another question: was this written as a theatre piece? With the exception of an opening at a pub, the entire narrative takes place at Bill's mansion, and frequently in one room. I imagine this may have been written for the stage and then retrofitted as a novel. No matter-- still much fun. As always, Wodehouse satisfies.

While I love Wodehouse-he is indisputably one of the masters of modern literature-this particular collection of stories (which originally appeared in Strand and Cosmopolitan in the early '30s) is rather weak. The main problem is that they are all of a piece, virtually every one revolves around a silly young man (generally one of the Drones Club cohort) and his affections for a beautiful girl. Invariably, the man falls for the woman and then due to various simple comic misfortunes, loses her. One or two is fine, but a whole book of the plot over and over gets rather tedious. What makes Wodehouse's longer stories work to much better effect are the existence of multiple storylines which elegantly dovetail a the end, along with smart, clever, or willful other characters to provide contrast and balance (for example, Jeeves, Uncle Fred, various Aunts). It should come as no surprise that the standout story here is the lone Uncle Fred entry. In short, this collection lacks the wit, pleasantly convoluted schemes, and even high level of prose, that one expects when picking up one of Plum's works.

Arguably his finest non-omnibus short story collection. Story for story, it's hard to imagine ANYONE writing material as consistently, inventively, and intoxicatingly funny as this. If your knowledge of P.G. Wodehouse is only of the Jeeves stories (which are wonderful in and of themselves), this is a terrifc way to start acquainting yourself with some of the other denizens of his fictional unvierse. Contains a mixture of Drones Club and Mulliner stories, and includes "Uncle Fred Flits By", recently voted as Plum's best-ever short story by members of P.G. Wodehouse societies worldwide.

Wodehouse is light, silly and amusing.
This one centers on a group of well- to-do gentlemen who have banded together to prevent each other from engaging in the folly of matrimony. One of these the wealthy producer Llewelyn has already made the mistake five times, and is leaving Hollywood for England. His lawyer and friend Trout an ertswhile member of Bachelors Anonymous is fearful that his friend will soon make the slip. He tends to that quite easily as he explains in one most amusing passage of the book.
"I have this unfortunate tendency to propose to them. There always comes a moment when I can't think of anything to say to keep the conversation from conking out so I ask them to marry me'.
The trans-Atlantic scene is complicated when a young playwright and former prize-fighter Joe Pickering becomes Llewelyn's assistant. Pickering 's romantic involvement with young sudden heiress Sally complicates things all around . Trout crosses the Atlantic and in the intricacies of the action the wind up is of course that all three stalwarts, Llewelyn Trout and Pickering find the loves of their lives and undermine and betray wholly the principle upon which 'Bachelors Anonymous' is founded.
Amusing , in a very light smiling way. No belly-laughs and nothing profound either.
Easy to see why it may be the cup- of- tea of many , but I am a coffee- drinker.

If you are a cat lover, I recommend that you read or listen to this book or audio cassette. I think you will find it entertaining. Each of the stories includes a significant story-line about a cat with a cute, mischievous or whimsical personality. I could see my cat or a cat that I know in many of the main characters. The stories and/or poems are told by readers with British accents each suited to the theme of the story. My favorite, though eerie, is The Black Cat by Edgar Allen Poe. I am amazed how brilliant the story sounded...like poetry, yet the end had an amazing, morbid twist. Definitely unforgettable.

Contains Wodehouse's only mystery (in addition to other stories). Not quite vintage Wodehouse but certainly funny and well worth reading. It is not in the same class as the Jeeves or Blandings stories but close. I only gave it 4 stars simply because I compared to his best works. A 2 star Wodehouse book is better than a 4 star with most other writers.

These are good stories, and they give an idea of how Wodehouse became popular. He was quite young himself when he wrote them, and they give the right sense of importance which young men would still give to school houses, games, popularity, etc.

Flashes of his great humor and invention appear here and there. It is worth reading if you love Wodehouse.

But for others, it may not be the best choice. There are descriptions of the games and such which will lose most of us. There are some decidedly out-dated expressions and attitudes. And the stories are seldom as witty or delightful as more mature work the author produced later.

The collection is probably more like 3.5 stars for fans. Don't give it to those you want snared by Wodehouse, though, or you may lose them forever.

P.S. I think J.K. Rolling probably owes his estate a few royalty checks!

Enter the world of Wodehouse and you are entering not only a bygone era but a fanciful rendition of a bygone era. Needless to say, Wodehouse in whatever story he tells is comic fun at its best. Bertie and Jeeves are perhaps the pinnacle of his acheivement. How then, to take it from the imagination of the printed page and render it in spoken form? This reader does an extremely fine job of it. All the inflections, all the proper preposterousness, all the sense of scene are there. I have only two minor quibbles, 1) that there is a certain lack of facility with the female voices which detracts, and 2) the whole is just a trifle rushed, which is not a small complaint considering that the world to be recreated here is one of pure fantasy where moments are to be deliciously lingered over, and every "eh, what" counts. Nevertheless, it is very enjoyable. Nevertheless, again, one disclaimer and notification, and I will state the same in typical English understatement: these adventures have been related on tape previously by another fellow, and you would be selling yourself, and Wodehouse, short if you did not investigate his exquisite and rollicking versions, and revel(if that is the word I am looking for) in those renditions. You will enjoy this. Nevertheless, get a chair, and read Wodehouse.

With this play on lines from Robert Burns, Bertie Wooster, the aristocratic and and dithery protagonist of P. G. Wodehouse's "Jeeves" novels, expresses his dismay at the way matters of love and quiet country life have "ganged" since his arrival at his aunt Dahlia's country estate. Shortly after his arrival, he is surprised to read in the newspaper that Roberta "Bobby" Wickham is engaged to marry him. Bobby, upon her arrival, quickly sets him straight--she is in love with his best friend Reginald "Kipper" Herring, and because she knows her parents find Herring unsuitable, has made them believe she will marry Bertie, whom they dislike even more. She believes that their discovery of the truth will be a relief.

At the same time, Aunt Dahlia persuades Bertie to try to break up the budding romance between Phyllis Mills and the American Willie Cream, also staying at the estate. Phyllis's mother, Aunt Dahlia's friend, does not like "Broadway Willie." Tact is necessary in dealing with this matter since Willie's father is a wealthy man negotiating important business deals with others at Aunt Dahlia's country estate. Jeeves is on vacation, and Aunt Dahlia, needing a butler of her own, hires Sir Roderick Glossop, a well known psychiatrist, to act as butler, his real job being to spy, purportedly, on Willie Cream to uncover unsavory details which can be used to break up his romance with Phyllis. During Bertie's stay, a piece of valuable antique silver, a creamer in the shape of a cow, disappears--perhaps a result of Willie Cream's "kleptomania."

As always, Bertie engages in word play and puns, the coining of new words, and quotations from well known works. He sometimes massacres English words, and he delights in misquoting in foreign languages. As always, he must rely on Jeeves, called back from a fishing vacation, to rescue him from the complications which result from his meddling.

The intricacy of the plot, the overlapping relationships of the characters, the use of irony and gentle satire, and the sparkling dialogue keep the reader engaged, despite the predictable outcome of the plot. First published in 1960, this type of mannered novel is now dated, and many readers will expect more from the novel than "just" entertainment. Wodehouse, however, is as good as it gets in providing clever, light entertainment, with delightful wordplay--while poking fun at the English countryhouse life which has now largely disappeared. Mary Whipple

Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit

Wodehouse has mesmerised countless readers with his sparkling humor. His popularity is undiminished even today, more than a quarter century after his death. The book under review is a painstaking and diligent work on the famed humorist. Eminently readable and informative. A must read for admirers of Wodehouse. The chapter on Wodehouse's misadvised broadcasts on German radio at the height of the Second World War - a folly that brought him much odium and good deal of hostility of his countrymen - is dealt with in great detail. Well written and meticulously researched effort.