Service with a Smile »

Comic timing would seem less of the essence in literature until you read the English wit of P. G. Wodehouse, who shows just how a well-placed comment or properly inflected phrase can create a response that is often all too rare during a reading session: A loud, hearty laugh.

In Service with a Smile, the eighth Wodehouse novel set at Blandings Castle, Lord Emsworth's home is overrun with pesky intruders, from the noisy boys of the local Church Lad's Brigade camping at the lake to the curmudgeonly Duke of Dunstable, who is scheming to steal Emsworth's peerless pig. Fortunately, Uncle Fred (in his final appearance) is on hand to sort everything out.