An Antarctic Mystery Book

This book is basically imitation-Wodehouse (with a touch of Dornford Yates, I think), but even sillier and more exaggerated than the real thing. Perhaps it was intended as parody. The trouble with trying to parody a comedy is that you run the risk of being mistaken for a bad imitator.

Its saving grace is that, parody or not, it's quite amusing in its own right, and could make an amiable time-passer for a journey, unless you have a low tolerance of silliness.

However, the story is deliberately silly and the characters are deliberate caricatures; which seems rather a shame, because the author could surely do better if he wanted to. I have the odd feeling that inside those caricatures are real characters struggling to get out, but the author is determined not to permit any escape.

I'm not a devotee of heavy literature, but this is such light reading that it almost floats away.

There is one slightly sour note: the main caricatures seem superficially likeable and well-meaning, but they're made to say such outrageous things that I suspect the author despises them. Mr Brett, if you despise your own characters, then why waste your time writing about them? For heaven's sake, invent characters for whom you can feel real affection, and write about them instead.

I didn't buy this book, incidentally: my mother sent it to me after reading it herself, with the idea that I might find it amusing.