Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit by P.G. WodehouseMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Classic Wodehouse hilarity. I think the Brinkley Court stories may be my favourites, probably because of the fondly disrespectful banter that goes on between Bertie and his beloved Aunt Dahlia (and the character of Aunt Dahlia herself, a hearty fox-hunting countrywoman who's also something of a schemer).
Here, the point of tension between Bertie and Jeeves (there always seems to be one) is that Bertie has grown a moustache, but Jeeves, displaying the feudal spirit of the title, doesn't let it hinder him from helping in the inevitable complications that accompany Bertie wherever he goes. He's once again engaged to Lady Florence Craye, who he very much does not want to marry (but he can't tell her that; one must be civil). Her previous fiancé, Stilton Cheesewright (previously featured in The Mating Season ) is cutting up rough about this and threatening bodily violence to Bertie; Aunt Dahlia has pawned her pearls to pay for a prominent author to do a serial in her magazine, Milady's Boudoir, so that she can sell it to Mr Trotter of Liverpool, who is under his wife's thumb; Trotter's stepson is in love with Florence Craye; Roderick Spode, previously seen in The Code of the Woosters , appears likely to expose Dahlia's schemes to her husband; and in general it's as tangled a plot as any in Wodehouse, the kind that only Jeeves can sort out (after Bertie has had plenty of alarums and excursions).
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Fun plot, Wodehouse's language skills in full flower, and in general a classic. The only thing that might have improved it would have been a scene or two with the volatile French chef Anatole and his quaint grasp of English idiom, but he remains, sadly, offstage.
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