Just Enough Jeeves, consisting of two novels and eleven short stories written by P.G. Wodehouse between 1910 and 1947 subsequently published in collection in 2010. A grand total of 712 pages of light-hearted British witticism.
It’s a lot to take in.

This collection is true to form. Jeeves and Wooster going at it in all weathers, delightfully entertaining and churning up a good laugh. But not without a few flaws, I’m afraid.
First: the overall length. 712 pages is an awful lot of anything to read in one go. I didn’t even attempt it, especially given that this was a collection and could easily and readily be broken up without breaking up a sense of narrative plot. Even so, having taken such precautions, I still found myself struggling to continue treading water as the final pages closed. Wodehouse is pretty strong stuff for such light-hearted fare. I find myself so full that I fancy a certain near-plagiarism of tone. Setting that aside for a moment, if I may beg your indulgence, we shall continue to the second flaw.
And this one is, or rather should have been, easily corrected.
To wit: the tales presented in this collation are presented all out of order.

The first novel in the collection, “Joy in the Morning,” was the last piece written. While the final presentation, “What Ho, Jeeves,” was one of the first pieces put to pen. The short stories were all written near and around that second-presented novel – mostly after – and well before the first presented novel. And while all can be read quite happily in any order whatsoever due to their light-hearted manner, it remains a fact that the first novel of the collection – the last piece written – refers consistently and constantly to the affairs related through the shorts and the novel presented in the final position of the collection!
Again I say, this is not a grave error. The stories do not in fact rely on perfect adherence to time and space to achieve their comic effects. But it does cause some little sensation of deja vu and general mental discomfort to discover that events referred to as having happened in the past did in fact happen in the past, were chronicled in the past, were available in the past, but were not as such presented in that more appropriate past.
One is simply left asking, “Why?”

I suppose I might have read the forward of the collection in order to discover this information, but I do dislike reading about a piece to be told how I am to experience it. I’d rather dive right in and experience it – and then perhaps after see if my experience lined up in any particulars with those of some other reader deemed sufficiently well-educated as to rate an Introductory Remark. And indeed, or “but rather,” upon perusing said Introduction upon the completion of the author’s own words, I still find myself rather in the dark as to why the publishers chose their particular line of ordination.
Ah well. Stunned as I am by a near-total immersion within the mind of Wooster and confounded as I am by a bit of literary time travel, I am still much entertained and diverted.
I merely recommend that if you find this tome in the library and feel the stir to pick it up, be advised to pay some attention to the publication dates of the pieces presented therein, and read accordingly.