nosey667's reviews
191 reviews

i was really looking forward to reading this book and it had everything that should make me thoroughly enjoy it but for some reason i just didnt. in fact its put me in one of my biggest slumps in a while. i just thought the writing or the way everything was carried out was bad or not gripping at all

I am aware that theres a rewritten verison of this thats split into two, but i wanted to read the original first. to be honest, i can see why it was split up & why he rewrote a lot of it. While the plot was fun at times, it did lack the Wodehouse feel a lot of the time. other than Psmith, who is so so funny and continues to be one of my favourite wodehouse characters, there's not many characters in this that feel like Wodehouse characters. theres not that much silliness going on other than when Psmith is around. I thought, being about cricket, it would be similar to the golf stories which are more so comedy love stories with a golf setting, but there was not that much comedy and no love stories, and lots of cricket. with Psmith next to them, none of the characters seemed particularly memorable. i thought Wyatt was entertaining and really funny but then

he was kicked out.</spoiler 
it still did make 3.75 stars because Psmith is just that good. i love the

part where he was moving around the boots

and that the final twist of the book was

the fact that Psmith was a cricketer, to his own dismay.

His personality is just so so entertaining that it really uplifted it and Mikes character, who overall didnt do much. im excited to see what they get up to together in the other books

this was another super enjoyable Blandings Castle installment by Wodehouse, and I believe the first appearance of uncle Fred. i enjoyed this book and it had all the classic schemes and love plots of a wodehouse book. I don't think i enjoyed it as much as some (i thought jt took a while for things to get going and didn't find the new characters particularly intriguing) but still very enjoyable nonetheless 

i liked some of these stories (the clicking of cuthbert especially) but i found others a little slow or boring. I think i preferred The Heart of a Goof over this collection 

One of my favourite Wodehouse books I've read so far. this was my first encounter with Psmith, and i think he was so endearing with all his strange eccentricities. ill definitely be getting my hands on the other psmith books because he was so entertaining!! there were moments in this book where i actually laughed (normally am a straight faced reader).

the flowerpot situations especially, maybe the first time Psmith threw one at Baxter. so funny!!

overall great installment to the Blandings Castle series

I think the first thing to consider when reading this book is it was obviously very important at its time and very clearly was written as a comment on society at the time. so its amazing in the sense that it delivers this message very clearly for 1850s people, however this is ultimately makes it a not-great read for present day people. the first quarter or half maybe is good, but after that i realised the characters were just having the same debate over and over again (is slavery good, or bad? and, should i become a christian?), and these debates are ALL these characters talked about. this made them feel very much just like puppets being used by the author to deliver her message. again, its very clear what her message is which is good for her time which very much needed such a message, but maybe she should have considered just writing a lengthy essay rather than writing in huge debates in puppet characters. i guess im glad ive read it, but it was rather tiring at the end despite being a very important piece of literature.