Jill the Reckless

Name: Jill the Reckless
Brand: Blackstone Audiobooks
Availability: InStock
Author: P. G. Wodehouse
ISBN: 9798228960909

Author: P. G. Wodehouse

Narrator: Anne Hancock

Unabridged: 12 hr 27 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Spoken Realms

Published: 04/21/2026

Categories: Fiction, Classic

Synopsis

Jill Mariner’s life as a London debutante is perfect: she has money, friends, and is engaged to a handsome Member of Parliament. But it all comes crashing down when her unreliable uncle squanders her fortune. Then there is the incident of plucky Jill hitting a man with a stick while he was attacking a parrot. The MP, appalled by her arrest, breaks off the engagement.So Jill and Uncle Chris depart for New York City, where Jill meets an acquaintance (the owner of the aforementioned parrot) who encourages her to try out for the same job she has: a chorus girl in an upcoming Broadway musical. Thus the stage is set for a potpourri of Wodehousian characters including formidable matrons (one on each side of the Atlantic), a hapless swain, and a near-replica of the author’s most famous creation, Bertie Wooster.Written in 1920, “Jill the Reckless” reflects PG Wodehouse’s own experiences as a librettist with the composer Guy Bolton. They wrote several popular Broadway musicals in the teens and 20s, full of happy toe-tapping numbers that delighted audiences. From this world we find the unscrupulous theater managers, anxious writers, overworked chorus girls, and the ever-present worry that the show might not be a hit.And what of Jill? She learns the dance steps and soldiers on despite her broken heart. But you can’t keep a good girl down. And doesn’t every 1920s Broadway comedy have a happy ending?

About P. G. Wodehouse

Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse (1881–1975) was an English humorist who wrote novels, short stories, plays, poems, song lyrics, and numerous pieces of journalism. He was highly popular throughout a career that lasted more than seventy years, and his many writings continue to be widely read. He is best known for his novels and short stories of Bertie Wooster and his manservant Jeeves and for his settings of English upper-class society of the pre– and post–World War I era. He lived in several countries before settling in the United States after World War II. During the 1920s, he collaborated with Broadway legends like Cole Porter and George Gershwin on musicals and, in the 1930s, expanded his repertoire by writing for motion pictures. He was honored with a knighthood in 1975.

About Anne Hancock

Anne Hancock began her career with the Library of Congress's National Library Service (NLS) Talking Books Program, where she has narrated more than 300 audiobooks in a variety of genres. An AudioFile Earphones Award winner, she has lived in France and the Netherlands and uses her training in the languages of both countries in her narration. In addition, she has successfully narrated books with English and Irish accents.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Nandakishore on September 13, 2020

This is a departure from the usual Wodehouse novel, in the sense that it is not rip-roaring situational comedy, but a poignant tale comprising love, heartbreak, despair and heroism in equal measure. Had it been told by one of those Russian novelists that Plum is fond of lampooning, it would have bee......more

Goodreads review by Abigail on July 29, 2023

P. G. Wodehouse is known of course for his witty satires of British upper-class life in the first decades of the twentieth century, his impeccable butlers who run rings around their twittish employers; his daft, inarticulate young men who nevertheless possess good instincts; his pompous dowagers and......more

Goodreads review by Scot on November 05, 2010

I've read a lot of Wodehouse, and I think this gem from 1920 is one of his best in the transatlantic-romantic-comedy genre, in which characters move between New York and London and across social classes, and conflicts of economic survival are overshadowed by the struggle of true love to conquer all.......more

Goodreads review by Douglas on March 27, 2018

Fun, fun, fun. Read again aloud with Nancy in March 2018.......more

Goodreads review by Nigeyb on January 23, 2025

Interesting to contrast Jill the Reckless (1920) with the Blandings series. This is more serious in tone yet still unmistakably P.G. Wodehouse. The characters are convincing, except the eternally accommodating, likeable and relentlessly upbeat Jill. So although Jill the Reckless is less of a mirth fe......more