My reviewer criteria. I like light, entertaining novels. I like smaller scale stories rather than epics. I like character focused novels featuring pleasant characters, with a minimum number of unpleasant ones. I greatly value clever and witty writing. I like first person, or close third person narratives. I dislike a lot of "head jumping" between POVs and flashbacks. I want a story, not a puzzle. While I am not opposed to violence, I dislike gore for the sake of gore. I find long and elaborate fight, action, and battle sequences tedious. Plot holes and things that happen for the convenience of the author annoy me. And I fear I'm a born critic in that I don't mind pointing out what I don't like in a story. However, I lay no claim to be the final arbitrator of style and taste, you need to decide for yourself what you like or dislike in a book.
Your opinions are always welcome. Comment below.
Summer Lightning by P. G. Wodehouse B
Galahad is engaged in writing his Reminiscences. Galahad "in his day had been a notable lad about town. A bean sabreur of Romano's. A Pink 'Un. A Pelican... Bookmakers called him by his pet name, barmaid had simpered beneath is gallant chaff. He had heard the chimes at midnight. And when he had looked in at the old Gardenia, commissionaires had fought for the privilege of throwing him out. A man, in a word, who should never have bet taught to write..." He has tales to tell of the youthful excesses of the now staid and respected nobles of the land, and Aunt Connie wants the manuscript destroyed before it can be published and they are shunned by everyone who counts.
Hugo Carmody, having lost his money running an ill fated nightclub with Ronnie Fish is now Lord Emsworth's private secretary and is in love with Millicent, a niece of Lord Emsworth, via his late brother Lancelot, who has control of her money. Meanwhile, Ronnie Fish, who Lord Emsworth is also a trustee of, is in love with a chorus girl by the name of Sue Brown, though his mother, Lord Emsworth's sister Julia want him to marry Millicent. After the wreck of the nightclub Aunt Julia took Ronnie to Biarritz to recover and there they met a Miss Schoonmaker who Aunt Connie has invited down to Blandings. Back in London Ronnie picks up Sue Brown in his two seater and arriving at his London residence meets Aunt Connie had come calling. Thinking quickly, he introduces Sue as Miss Schoonmaker. And so, Sue Brown joins the ranks of guests of Blandings sailing under false flags. In the meanwhile a private detective by the name of Pilbeam, who has made unwanted advances towards Sue Brown, has been hired to steal Galahad's manuscript by their neighbor Sir Gregory Parsloe who hopes to be selected to stand for parliament and fears that if Galahad's reminiscences are published his chances would be nil. And I'm just scratching the surface here...
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Heavy Weather by P. G. Wodehouse B+
In this case we have Monty Bodkin, who has to hold down a job for a year to receive his sweetheart's father's approval to marry her, plus Ronny Fish who needs Lord Elmsworth to release some of the money held in trust for him so that he can marry his true love, the ex-chorus girl Sue Brown, a wedding apposed by his mother, Julia Fish, one of the many sisters of Constance, Lord Elmsworth, and Galahad. Julia and her sister Connie hope to browbeat Elmsworth into not giving Ronnie the money and nix the marriage. And then there are those memoirs of Galahad, featured in the last novel, which would cause an outrage amongst their peers. He had agreed to suppress his Reminiscences in that novel, but the publisher who had purchased the rights, Lord Tilbury, hopes to steal them and publish them, as originally promised... And being Wodehouse, it get pretty involved...
"The Crime Wave at Blandings" included in Lord Elmsworth and others by P. G. Wodehouse B
This short story sees the tentative return of the Efficient Baxter as a tutor to Lord Emsworth's grandson George, who is staying at Blandings for the summer and whom Aunt Connie thinks is running wild. Lord Emsworth sees, no doubt correctly, that the hiring of Baxter for the summer is the narrow edge of the wedge to get him back into the house as Lord Emsworth's private secretary, something Aunt Connie has always wanted. The crime wave of the title revolves around people for various reasons, including Lord Emsworth, shooting Baxter in the butt with George's air rifle.
The next installment in the Blandings Castle Saga, was written six years after Heavy Weather in 1939. We have all the usual suspects, plus a new cast of guests and imposters, including the return of the Efficient Baxter, who used to be Lord Elmsworth's super efficient private secretary, and whom he believes to be crazy. We also have the Duke of Dunstable, who does actually appear to be potty, Pongo Twistleton, who owes 200 pounds to a bookie and doesn't have it, his Uncle Fred (Lord Ickenham) who's wife is out of the country at the moment so he's free to help his nephew, and Sir Roderick Glossop, the familiar "brain specialist" who is invited to Blandings to observe The Duke of Donstable... and well, you get the idea...
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