A Few Quick Ones by P.G. Wodehouse

I'm reading P.G. Wodehouse books three or four times a year these days - they all read quickly, he was a master of effortless funny prose, and he wrote about a hundred of the things over his long career - so I'm mostly keeping these notes short and focused. If you're looking for a "why read Wodehouse" in the first place, either just re-read the last sentence or dive into what I've written about him in the past.

A Few Quick Ones is a 1959 short-story collection, gathering ten pieces that originally appeared in magazines over the previous decade. It's got most of his major series, at least the ones that appear in short form in that phase of his career: Mr. Mulliner, the Oldest Member, Ukridge, one Jeeves story, and a whole bunch of random Drones Club habitués.

All the stories are short and breezy, basically one set of complications that gets worked out in a traditional, humorous way. The whole thing takes up only just a bit more than two hundred pages.

I do recommend it, as I do nearly all of Wodehouse. But, if you're looking to start on his shorter stories, I'd suggest going to Lord Emsworth and Others first, which has the sublime "The Crime Wave at Blandings" in it, or possibly Carry On, Jeeves, the first of that series.

And, to keep this from being too short, let me end with a quote, to give you a sense of what Wodehouse could do when he got up to it:

It was a large, uncouth dog, in its physique and deportment not unlike the hound of the Baskervilles, though of course not covered with phosphorous, and it seemed to be cross about something. Its air was that of a dog which has discovered plots against its person, and it appeared to be under the impression that in Augustus it had found one of the ringleaders, for the menace in its manner, as it now advanced on him, was unmistakable.

That's from "The Right Approach," pages 62-63 in this edition. If it sounds amusing to you, Wodehouse will likely suit.