Customer Reviews

Big Money

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This 1931 novel has long been one of my favorites among Wodehouse's many novels. It's a mix of farce and romantic comedy; whereas in much of Wodehouse's later work, the love plots seem almost perfunctory, here the romance between English Berry Conway and American Ann Moon (Wodehouse loved to work in trans-continental romances for his American readers) takes up much of the novel and is given a sweetness and warmth not always apparent in Wodehouse's funny, but sometimes slightly mechanical, post-WWII work. Of course, there's plenty of farcical action too, including many inspired sequences set in Wodehouse's "Valley Fields" (a thinly disguised version of the London suburb Dulwich). The hilarious chapter in which Lord Hoddesdon visits Valley Fields - and runs into a menacing fellow with an admiration for Stalin - is alone worth the price of this wonderful book.

I LOVE Wodehouse. I have this system where I try to read really thick "smart" books. You know, like the kind you bring up when you're trying to impress people with your intellectual prowess ("Oh yes, I completely agree. In fact, in the 'Metaphysics of Morals', Kant says basically the same thing, albeit more obtusely.") When my brains slither out through my ears in protest, that's when I know that it is time to put down the philosophy and pick up a Wodehouse. They're insanely funny and impossibly witty, and it gives me time to collect the pieces of my gray matter and shove them back in my head for another go at snooty intellectualism.

This one begins at the Drones Club, just like several of the Bertie Wooster stories, but these are not the Wooster characters. But with wonderful names like the Biscuit, Torquil, Kitchie, and Merwyn Flock, PGW does use some of his usual character types and plot lines: couples engaged to the wrong people, young men needing money. This is good vintage Wodehouse and a rather complex novel, not just a series of stories thrown together. And it was a lot of fun. But give me Bertie Wooster any day!

For me, reading P.G. Wodehouse usually is like opening the windows to my mind on a bright, crisp spring morning. Bertie or Psmith serve to sweep away the accumulated dust and doldrums and I put the book down refreshed and smiling. Perhaps I really have become a curmudgeon, perhaps there now is simply too much clutter in the attic of my mind, or perhaps BIG MONEY is not up to par for Wodehouse. Whichever, reading it did not work the usual charm. The novel is too much of a trifle, too much of a farce.

In BIG MONEY, there are co-protagonists. One, Lord Biskerton ("Biscuit"), is the typical Wodehousian fop. The other, John Beresford Conway ("Berry"), is a conscientious young man of straitened means who works as private secretary for a rich old coot, named T. Paterson Frisby. During the course of the novel, Biscuit and Berry end up getting engaged to the same young woman (Frisby's niece) and they become entangled with Frisby and two shady henchmen in a battle for control of a copper mine in Arizona (the Dream Come True mine).

The pace is brisk, the writing breezy. Wodehouse demonstrates once again that he is a champion spinner of similes: Sir Herbert "gazed at Berry as if he were an escape of sewer-gas"; "Mr Frisby made a noise extraordinarily like a sea-lion at the Zoo asking for fish"; "He stared at Berry with eyes like apprehensive poached eggs." Indeed, it was the superior prose that carried me through the improbable twists and turns of the novel to its conclusion.

If you are a confirmed addict of Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, you know what to expect from BIG MONEY, just don't expect him at his finest. If you are a newcomer to Wodehouse, in order to give him a fair shake you probably should first try something else (almost anything else).

P.G. Wodehouse is certainly one of the most gifted comic writers to have ever lived. Famous for his novels featuring Bertie Wooster and his inimitable valet, Jeeves, Wodehouse's other assorted novels are a vast treasure trove of manic fun and witty humor. "Big Money" is no exception to the rule, as complication after complication abounds, leaving the reader wondering how anything could ever be cleared up in the end.

Berry Conway is in desperate need of money. His supposedly rich aunt has died, leaving him with a lot of worthless holdings but no cash. So he resorts to a job as secretary to T. Paterson Frisby who just happens to have a young American niece who needs chaperoning. Berry sets it up with his friend Lord Biskerton, aka the Biscuit, to have his Aunt Vera serve as chaperone with the hope that some money may come his friend's way, for the Biscuit (and his entire family) are in need of funds too. Trying to return the favor, the Biscuit suggests that Berry sell the worthless copper mine he has been stuck with to some mug who wouldn't know it wasn't worth a few hundred pounds. Little do either know that the mine, the Dream Come True, is actually worth money and that T. Paterson Frisby would do anything, even screwing over his own employee, to get that mine. And what no one accounts for is the fact that Frisby's niece, the beautiful Ann Moon, would find herself engaged to not only the Biscuit, but to his best friend Berry as well. After all, all is fair in love and war.

"Big Money" is a fast paced, hilariously witty read. There are so many inane twists and turns within the plot that readers may wonder how things could ever be put right. The resolution is a wild, deluded night in the seemingly perfect London suburbs that leave the three young lovebirds in for a lot of surprises. While the reader knows that all will turn out well there seem to be some ends that need to be tied up that Wodehouse did not directly write. All in all, "Big Money" is classic Wodehouse. One must agree with the Hugh Laurie quote on the cover, that Wodehouse was the "funniest writer ever to put words on paper."

As the book opens and our hero asks, 'Are you sure you want to hear the story of my life, Biscuit?' 'My dear chap, I'm agog...', you know you are in for a fast and hilarious ride. I am in agreement with other Wodehousians when they say a 4 star Wodehouse still walks on the backs of others; but this is pure 5 star. This book is light enough, gay enough, to let you leave everything behind and turn pages faster than a literary rabbit late for a luncheon date. Lord Biscuit is original, he is not Psmith or Bertie or Ukridge. I guess one could say that one has found a lesser known classic, don't you know; and if you are not a Wodehouse nut, reading this will give you Wode-cred with the die-hards. . .

I enjoy all of P.G. Wodehouse's novels, and this one is just great. I really liked it. The story kept me interested. If you like a book that's funny and witty here's the book for you.