Jeeves and the Wedding Bells???

[horriyuo.livejournal.com]

A chap called Sebastian Faulks has written a 'homage' to P.G Wodehouse entitled 'Jeeves and the wedding bells' it sounds rather interesting, I was wondering if any of you think it's worth reading.

Article here

I probably won't be able to buy it yet but I'll probably end up buying it when I've read some reviews -hint, hint-

Comments

[haikitteh.livejournal.com]

That's quite a review! He loved it, and claims to be a huge fan of Wodehouse, so he knows what the tone should be. Very encouraging.

I'm definitely going to read it. Too curious to resist. Especially if reviews like this keep coming in.

[margi-lynn.livejournal.com]

I can't wait to see if one of the comm reviews the book, because I don't really want to buy it until I see what other people think about it.

[storyfan.livejournal.com]

A reviewer from the WAshington Post hates it and says better stuff can be found right here on this comm. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/compost/wp/2013/11/05/jeeves-and-the-wedding-bells-is-worse-than-bad-fanfiction/?algtrack=mixedrecfill-2&tid=btm_rex_2

I tried to do a post about it, but my post is in the moderation queue.

[haikitteh.livejournal.com]

Ouch. OUCH, I say. That was excruciating, and excoriating. And just to add insult to injury, that Alexandra Petri wrote a funnier article than the sample of Faulks that I read on Amazon.

But I absolutely love that our comm got a shout-out on the Washington Post! It's hilarious that the ravening masses might soon be stumbling into our lair to get a peek at some delicious historical m/m delights.

[erynn999.livejournal.com]

I am afraid. I am very afraid.

a review.

[horacebulregard.livejournal.com]

I have read the article in question. As it has been asked for, I shall endeavour to add my honest opinion to the pool of data.

Necessity compelled me when I saw the name Jeeves in big friendly letters to fly across the book store and promptly purchase the article. I believe this was last month. Having read some scathing reviews about it, I was not expecting literary genius. I know there is a good reason why wodehouse is who he is, and that is because no one else is equal to the task.

Even with my low expectations I somehow managed to come away disappointed. Mister Faulks blatantly disregarded the tone of the source material. He systematically went through every ongoing trope that makes a Jeeves book what it is and twisted and warped them to his own devices. I am thinking in particular of an instance where Jeeves quotes a poem and Bertie knows the author. No mention of expunging the poet Burns from his mind is forthcoming, the author merely does this to make Bertie look smart, failing to realize that's not the point.

A related qualm I had was that it fell into the trap of attempting to focus on character development. For me, reading wodehouse has nothing to do with well rounded characters, which is why I find it so confusingly delightful since in any other instance I would call that a fault. Wodehouse finds its charm in simple, whimsical characters and cleverly written prose. Mister Faulks spends much of his time trying to flesh out the deeper, more serious side of the characters, taking away much of the imagination work I would prefer to do myself, if at all.

Normally, I feel in these situations that the sanctioned novels are being held to an unfair standard, and often end my critique with the concession that it may be a good book of its own right if it were not considered a part of a great series. I do not feel this obligation with this book. It is full of cliches and tropes that signify lazy writing more than an attempt to follow the Jeeves formula. I am often pretty level emotionally, but I found myself feeling angry and annoyed upon completion of this book.

I know the need to read this novel is strong, for the sake of both curiosity and completions sake, but don't expect it to be another magical installation in the world of wodehouse. I'd suggest just sticking to fiction from here, since most writers on this site seem to have a far better idea how to mimic the style and are often far more original in the ways they deviate from the conventional narrative form.