Wodehouse: Cocktail Time

Cocktail Time
P.G. Wodehouse
(Overlook, 2004) [1958]
244 p.

It all began with a Brazil nut aimed squarely at a top-hat at the Drones Club. In time the repercussions of this mischievous incident unfolded themselves and covered the earth, or at least that portion of it in and around the sprawling estate of Dovetail Hammer: books were written; authorship was disavowed, sold, and reclaimed; scandals erupted; imitation walnut cabinets became hot commodities; unsuspecting nephews were biffed on nappers with coshes; butlers locked their employers into cellars; and the world, to sum up, spun madly out of control.

Into this melee comes Lord Ickenham, aka Uncle Fred, who sets to work to bring order from chaos, sweetness and light from confusion and consternation, and harmony from discord — though not without causing a few problems of his own in the process. Wodehouse is in fine fettle once again, and I thoroughly enjoyed the book. This is one of the few Uncle Fred books not intersecting with the Blandings Castle series, so we have an entirely new set of characters to get to know. Delightful.