“For as long as I’m immersed in a P.G. Wodehouse book, it’s possible to keep the real world at bay and live in a far, far nicer, funnier one where happy endings are the order of the day.”
NO MAJOR SPOILERS
When it was announced a couple of years ago that Irvine Welsh was releasing a prequel to Trainspotting with Skagboys, it took me back to a different reading age. Trainspotting remains one of my favourite novels and during my younger years I spent a lot of time in Welsh’s world, with Trainspotting, Glue, Maribou Stork Nightmares, Porno and the rest. The problem was, was I going to be able to just fall back into this universe? I bought the novel to see.
This time, it was Bertram Wooster (Jeeves’s young Master) who stole the show as Jeeves role though pivotal when it came to rendering clinical advice, was reduced to the bare minimum.
The quality, quantity, variety and sheer absurdity of the insults delivered in this short novel are off the charts and as usual the entire narrative is replete with similes at the rate of at least 3000 per paragraph . The best moments were the dialogues between Wooster and his Aunt Dahlia and the number of showdowns between Wooster and the pumpkin headed Cheesewright. Let me give you couple of examples which will leave you in splits :-
“Aunt Agatha – the one who kills rats with her teeth and devours her young”
“They were creeps of the first order and would bore the pants off me ”
Surely, another 5/5 for PG Wodehouse
Reviewed by:
Aditya Singh
Added 6th August 2017
