Customer Reviews

BACHELORS ANONYMOUS

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You may remember Ivor Llewellyn from The Plot That Thickened. He is the tough-minded movie mogul who turns into putty whenever he's around a woman. What's even more surprising, he is inclined to propose marriage to even the most unsuitable female . . . just to fill in gaps in the conversation. He's been through five marriages so far. His awful marriage to Grayce ended in The Plot That Thickened.

Now, Llewellyn is a single again, and his divorce lawyer is trying to help him avoid another disaster. Mr. Ephraim Trout of Trout, Wapshott and Edelstein tells Llewellyn that Trout has avoided matrimony by relying on a little circle of friends that call themselves Bachelors Anonymous, an organization inspired by the principles of Alcoholics Anonymous. They dissuade their fellows from proposing when the urge strikes and sometimes even take stronger action.

But Llewellyn is about to go to London where there is no such organization. Trout proposes that he introduce Llewellyn to a law firm there in order to find a lawyer to play that role. Llewellyn agrees.

At the same time, the imperious Vera Dalrymple is in the process of ruining a new play, Cousin Angela, for its playwright, Joe Pickering. Inadvertently, Joe makes a good impression on Llewellyn by tossing him from the stage door when he arrives ready to propose to Vera. So through his lawyer friend, Joe gets the job of protecting Llewellyn from proposals.

But there's a complication, Joe has become smitten with a remarkable young woman, Miss Sally Fitch. Her life has taken a turn for the better when she inherits some money and a great apartment from a former employer . . . conditioned on not smoking for two years. A female private detective comes to live with her to make sure that she isn't smoking.

Will Llewellyn avoid Vera's clutches? Will Joe and Sally find each other? Will Sally get her money?

You'll have to read the book to find out, but the trail is a twisted and hilarious one.

Anyone who liked The Plot That Thickened will be delighted with this book. The premises are extreme, but if you can swallow them they take you into some fun territory.

P.G. Wodehouse once said that you could write about life as it is or as musical comedy without the music. He preferred the latter, and perhaps none of his books better captures that wonderful comic perspective as Bachelors Anonymous does.

I would have rated the book higher, but I think that those who haven't read other P.G. Wodehouse books might find this one a little extreme in its characters and plots . . . and that might make suspending disbelief harder. For me, though, this is a five-star laugh!!

After you finish, think about where you could accomplish more if your friends helped you. Then, ask for that help!

P.G. Wodehouse was born in 1881 and is probably best known for his Jeeves and Wooster books. "Bachelors Anonymous" was first published in 1973, only two years before he died, and is one of his standalone novels.

Ivor Llewellyn is the exceptionally rich and internationally famous head of the Superba Llewellyn Film Studio, based in Hollywood. Unfortunately, and rather tellingly, one of his closest personal friends is his divorce lawyer, Ephraim Trout. Having just come through their fifth divorce together, Trout - perhaps surprisingly, for a lawyer - now views the movie mogul as more than just a steady meal ticket. Llewellyn is now moving to London for a spell, officially to smarten up the London operation - however, it is a move that meets with Trout's approval. He feels that London's comparatively lousy climate will suppress Llewellyn's tendency to propose. Trout, unlike Llewellyn, has never married : he's been a longstanding member of Bachelors Anonymous, an organisation dedicated to the single life. Any member who feels like they may be falling off the wagon - and, say, inviting a young lady to dinner or to the theatre - can contact his fellow members for help. "Calm succeeds turmoil", says Mr Trout, "and the madness passes". However, while Trout feels London's climate will be a help, he's a little uncomfortable that there's no London chapter of Bachelors Anonymous. To this end, he's advised Llewellyn to get in touch with Nichols, Erridge and Trubshaw - a firm of lawyers based in the English city. Still, following a discussion with the members of the LA Chapter of his noble organisation, he decides to tidy up his affairs at work so he can travel to London and give Llewellyn his undivided attention. Unfortunately, Llewellyn has barely arrived in London before he has forgotten all about Nichols, Erridge and Trubshaw...and falls in with an actress called Vera Dalrymple.

Ms Dalrymple, when Ivor first meets her, is starring in a play called "Cousin Angela". The play was written by Joe Pickering who - right up until he met his bossy, bad-tempered leading lady - had been a light-hearted and cheerful soul. Joe spends his days working in a solicitor's office, and - having recently won the middleweight amateur championship - is a fairly useful boxer. On the play's closing night, Joe actually throws a drunken Llewellyn out of the theatre - the mogul was going to thump Mac, the doorman, believing he had insulted a friend called Jack Warner. (In fact, Mac been warning Joe that Sir Jaklyn Warner, a broke Baronet, was looking to borrow some money). Joe had also met Sally Fitch for the first time at the theatre - a journalist, Sally was interviewing him for a women's magazine. (Joe, in typical Wodehousian fashion, is immediately impressed with his interviewer - luckily enough, as they spend the rest of the book unable to avoid each other). Sally is a clergyman's daughter, and was once employed by Letitia Carberry - a keen supporter of the Anti-Tobacco League. Her employment there wound up when Ms Carberry went off to South America to tackle that continent's smoking habit. Coincidentally, Sally is also the ex-fiancée of a certain cash-strapped nobleman. Joe and Sally next meet at the offices of Nichols, Erridge and Trubshaw...Joe has been earmarked as Llewellyn's protection, while Sally is about to come into a little Carberry-related money. Naturally, things do not run smoothly...particularly with the arrival of Trout.

As usual with Wodehouse, an easily read, funny and enjoyable book. Absolutely recommended.

Bachelors Anonymous is a self-help group of gentlemen that believes a celibate life is the best life. These saintly marauders are not only there for each other, they will also cheerfully intervene on behalf of any man, saving him from the horrors of marriage whether welcomed or not. In their eyes even one date is cause for alarm because as we all know, dinner leads to marriage. When one such man deemed to be of high risk (he's been married five times previously) announces he will be moving to London, for which there is no chapter, the Bachelors not only demand he have an emissary, but send along a chaperon as well! It is this well-intentioned, albeit misguided, assistance that fuels the mishaps and confusion of our heroes and heroines, tearing lives apart before ultimately rubber-cementing them back together again.

Though P.G. Wodehouse does tend to recycle his plot lines and wrap his stories up in a nice little bow at the end, on the whole, Bachelors Anonymous is a solid effort that still holds up today.

This is an easy read: short, nicely-written and moves at a good pace. The language is formal and a bit dated, and the book is peppered with fifty-cent words and bone-dry wit, but if you enjoy this sort of métier you will find yourself entertained.

PGW's books rarely fail to amuse and entertain, and certainly "Bachelors" is no exception. Big-time Hollywood producer Ivor Llewellyn, a five-time divorcee (due to a compulsion to propose over dinner) is off to London where his California divorce lawyer, Ephraim Trout, fears he might fall to the wiles of yet another woman. Trout belongs to "B.A.", patterned after AA, which helps men prevent getting married off. He suggests Llewellyn look up a lawyer while in England to help fill the gap. Sure enough, Llewellyn hires Joe Pickering, a young attorney and fledgling playwright, who has just been smitten by a fledgling reporter, Sally Fitch. Meanwhile, Trout decides to come to London himself in case the "big gun" is needed, and, while interfering in the budding Fitch/Pickering romance, falls for a "comfortable" neighbor lady, Amelia Bingham. Llewellyn spends the whole time avoiding being trapped by Vera Dalrymple, star of Pickering's now closed first play. There's a few more players in this comical farce, but you get the drift... And will they all live happily ever after ?!?!

As with his Bertie and Jeeves books, Wodehouse's storyline is little more than an excuse to parade his silly characters and their antics, revealing all too common human foibles at which we can share a low-cost laugh or two. His short novels tend to fly by, with rarely a serious thought or puzzling intrigue to slow us down, just sheer frivolity for a couple of hours. Reading with a smile all the while - this is a good thing, right?

I acquired this novel in about 1974 at the Strand Book Store in NYC. On the remainder table for a buck ninety five. I knew the name Wodehouse, though I'm not sure I had read any of his books then. I bought it, and have carried it through six states in the last 38 years, before yanking it off the shelf today. I am glad I'll not be carrying it to state number seven.

It's not bad, not bad at all. But it is not quite wonderful either. It would have worked much better as a play or movie, for the dialogue, performed by wonderful British actors, could have been delightful, and the sets sumptuous. It is said that mediocre books make better movies than great ones. And this would certainly fit the bill. Contrived plot, silly characters, grand sets, flitting and dashing about, the big surpriseroo at the end, all the Wodehouse flaws without the usual delights, oh yes, a perfect Masterpiece Theater possibility. Not sorry I spent two hours reading it, not at all. Laughed aloud several times, chuckled happily many more. But ol' P.G. was tired when he wrote this, near the end of an astounding career and somewhat tapped out. Let's quote Dick Martin (who must have said this a few years before this was published) to conclude:
I belong to Bridegrooms Anonymous. Whenever I feel like getting married, they send over a lady in a housecoat and hair curlers to burn my toast for me.

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.

This novel has an amusing premise - a band of bachelors who form a support network for men who are on the brink of proposing to females. The main character of the book is a man who has been married numerous times because he feels uncomfortable when there are silences in the conversation with an unmarried female companion. To break this awkward silence and to open a minefield of discussion, he proposes to them. He is on the brink of falling into this trap again and that is where the book begins. Despite this promisingly amusing beginning, the book does not succeed in holding the reader's attention. You are glad that it's all finally over, as the book struggles laboriously to its all-too-distant end.