Customer Reviews

Return of Jeeves

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Attention devoted plum fanatics.Above title out again in penguin.Good(ish)plot suffering from lack of our hero Wooster.Jeeves on loan to another employer is as good as ever but what odd scenarios we find him in.Something of an oddball in the jeeves\bertie canon but very well worth the long wait for publication.

While the perfect gentleman's gentleman Jeeves is nothing without his master, Bertie Wooster, "The Return of Jeeves" finds the butler in the temporary employ of Bill Towcester. The recently landed lord finds that the aristocracy in England may have titles and manors, but very little money to pay for upkeep. Lord Towcester must find some sort of employ that allows him to raise funds, but his grand scheme goes absurdly awry.

Bill Towcester and Jeeves decide to employ their knowledge of horse racing to earn those funds, hiding their true identities through disguises, and making a tidy profit for themselves. Then comes Captain Biggar, a hunter with a strict honor code, who makes an unlikely bet that miraculously wins, but leaves Lord Towcester without the cash to pay up. He takes off and Captain Biggar follows him, and hilarity ensues. For not only must Bill keep his identity secret from the angry captain, but also from his beloved fiancee who knows nothing of his venture. And as if Lord Towcester didn't have enough chaos in his life, his sister brings along an American lady who might be interested in purchasing his home and solving all of his problems. Too bad for him that she is a woman he once romanced while on vacation, one he never told his fiancee about.

"The Return of Jeeves" is a quick-paced and witty comedic read. P.G. Wodehouse makes the intelligent and know-it-all Jeeves a likeable character, who charms and quotes his way thorugh absurd and trying situations. As Lord Towcester manages to enmesh himself even more deeply into a problematic situation, readers will wonder how all will possibly be solved, and happily at that. And they will laugh all the way through to the end.

This is one of P.G. Wodehouses lesser efforts. The books plods rather than races along. All the other Jeeves books are written from the point of view of Bertie Wooster, but with Bertie gone this tactic cannot be used and the book suffers as a consequence. Only get it if you are making a collection of Wodehouse. Two other points. Firstly, the character in the novel is the Earl of Rowcester (not Towcester) and secondly the book was previously published as 'Ring for Jeeves'

True, this isn't the bundle of delight that all the Bertie Wooster novels are. If I was going to recommend a Jeeves novel to someone new to Wodehouse, this is the last one I'd pick. But - that doesn't make it all that bad of a novel. I missed Bertie sorely, but it was an entertaining story, with some really funny moments.

If you have read all the Jeeves/Bertie stories and want more, this is worth a look. Rather like the short story 'Bertie Changes His Mind' which was written from a Jeeves POV - it's an interesting experiment, and while it's a bit odd to read, leaving us grateful that the majority of the Jeeves stories are written by Bertie, it reveals some aspects of Jeeves's character that we might not otherwise get.

Because there is no first person narrative, and Jeeves isn't being shown to us through the eyes of Bertie Wooster, Jeeves is presented quite differently, and you get the impression that Wodehouse was taking the opportunity to demonstrate his personal admiration for the character Jeeves that he created and evolved. Jeeves is almost god-like in his perfection, and yet paradoxically, he also comes across as more human. These aspects make it an interesting read for anyone who loves the character of Jeeves.

Bertie Wooster has gone off to school in an attempt to learn how to fend for himself, (which in Bertie's case meant locating and donning his own socks).

Jeeves has gone to the household of the Earl of Towcester, a young gentleman as much in need of Jeeves as Bertie. The Earl has a large estate, a fiancee, a sister and brother-in-law and a desperate need for ready cash. He and Jeeves attempt to remedy this problem by becoming turf accountants (bookies to us Americans). Naturally this only makes matters worse.

As one would expect in a Wodehouse novel the situation rapidly becomes absurd, the long lost appear, romance blooms and goes awry, wrong conclusions are reached and a wonderful time is had by all.

This is a hilarious story, perfect escapism for those times when the world begins to get too serious.