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What Next?
Jim Grant has always expected to become a millionaire when his guardian died. But now the late Uncle Alf's attorneys tell him that, although the estate is his alone, only £500 of the fortune remains. A crestfallen Jim mulls over the few ways in which a young gentleman with no work experience can earn a living. None of these will allow him to achieve his dream: to convince Mary Steele to marry him. He resolves to economize, first by giving up his house and his valet, Lush.
But Lush has other plans. In fact, this quiet, efficient man from the background of Jim Grant's life is brimming with ideas. The proposition he makes to his employer requires the precious £500, but it promises fun and excitement and it may—just may—change both men's lives for the better.
But Lush has other plans. In fact, this quiet, efficient man from the background of Jim Grant's life is brimming with ideas. The proposition he makes to his employer requires the precious £500, but it promises fun and excitement and it may—just may—change both men's lives for the better.
293 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1921
About the author
Denis Mackail
42 books10 followersDenis George Mackail was born in Kensington, London to the writer John William Mackail and Margaret Burne-Jones, daughter of the painter Edward Burne-Jones. Educated at St Paul's School, Hammersmith, he went to Balliol College, Oxford, but failed to complete his degree through ill-health after two years.
His first work was as a set designer, notably for J.M. Barrie's The Adored One and George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion (1914). The outbreak of World War I interrupted this promising start, however, and Denis, not fit enough for active service, worked in the War Office and the Board of Trade.
In 1917 he married Diana Granet, only child of the railway manager Sir Guy Granet, who was a director-general for railways in the War Office. The couple had two children, Mary (born 28 March 1919) and Anne (born 12 January 1922) and lived in Chelsea, London. It was the necessity of supporting his young family that led Denis to write a novel when office jobs became insecure after the end of the war.
With his novel published, his first short-story accepted by the prestigious Strand Magazine and the services of a literary agent, A. P. Watt, Denis was soon earning enough from his writing to give up office work. He published a novel every year from 1920 to 1938 and among his literary friends were P. G. Wodehouse and A. A. Milne.
During the 1930s Mackail lived at Bishopstone House, Bishopstone near Seaford, Sussex
As therapy from a nervous breakdown, Denis agreed to write the official biography of J.M. Barrie, which appeared in 1941. He went on to produce seven more novels and some books of reminiscences, but after the early death of his wife in 1949, he published no more and lived quietly in London until his death.
His sister was the novelist Angela Thirkell.
His first work was as a set designer, notably for J.M. Barrie's The Adored One and George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion (1914). The outbreak of World War I interrupted this promising start, however, and Denis, not fit enough for active service, worked in the War Office and the Board of Trade.
In 1917 he married Diana Granet, only child of the railway manager Sir Guy Granet, who was a director-general for railways in the War Office. The couple had two children, Mary (born 28 March 1919) and Anne (born 12 January 1922) and lived in Chelsea, London. It was the necessity of supporting his young family that led Denis to write a novel when office jobs became insecure after the end of the war.
With his novel published, his first short-story accepted by the prestigious Strand Magazine and the services of a literary agent, A. P. Watt, Denis was soon earning enough from his writing to give up office work. He published a novel every year from 1920 to 1938 and among his literary friends were P. G. Wodehouse and A. A. Milne.
During the 1930s Mackail lived at Bishopstone House, Bishopstone near Seaford, Sussex
As therapy from a nervous breakdown, Denis agreed to write the official biography of J.M. Barrie, which appeared in 1941. He went on to produce seven more novels and some books of reminiscences, but after the early death of his wife in 1949, he published no more and lived quietly in London until his death.
His sister was the novelist Angela Thirkell.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
March 12, 2018
Burning through some light fiction as a means to an end; Mackail was another Wodhouse pal (and brother to novelist Angela Thirkell) whose novels were pleasantly dull, thoroughly middle-class, and generally pretty frivolous. (That last is usually a good thing in my book.) What Next? is a profoundly inconsequential story, perhaps the most notable aspect of which is an attempt to lend the Jeeves-Wooster dynamic a bit more psychological realism (thereby making it all the more unbelievable). In bare outline, it's a Wodehouse plot, but Mackail is so conscientiously dull a chronicler that it's not until the third act that events take on the farcical tone they should have had all along. It's still preposterously sweet and unthinkingly reactionary, in the way practically all popular English fiction was at the time (the plot includes a hefty if sub rosa amount of antisemitism), but Mackail's an engaging and amusing enough writer that there's plenty of enjoyment, especially in the last third.
September 15, 2012
Hilarious, witty, from the Bright Young Things era..what with valets and spats and houses in the country there is a hint of P.G. Wodehouse but the characters here are more believable...many laugh out loud moments...exceedingly entertaining, it kept me engrossed to the end..
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews