Love Insurance

By: Earl Derr Biggers

Narrated by: Jim Patton

Lord Harrowby came to Lloyds of London with a most unusual request. He wanted to ensure that nothing would prevent his imminent wedding and expected a big policy payout if things didn’t work out. It was insurance man Dick Minot’s responsibility to make sure everything worked smoothly. Trouble is, Dick Minot fell in love with the bride! What to do?

Hilarity ensues as Dick tackles one crisis after another with a conflicted heart in this 1914 farcical romantic comedy. Kidnapping, jewelry heists, blackmail, past infidelity—all trying to foul up the works in a tropical paradise. Written by the world-famous creator of Chinese detective Charlie Chan!

Public Domain (P)2022 by James B. Patton

First-Rate Second Tier Stuff

Of all the novelists active during the late 18th and early 19th centuries, we read Jane Austen. Of all the dramatists scribbling during the late 16th and early 17th centuries, we read Shakespeare. And if you read any of Austen's or Shakespeare's contemporaries, you understand why we read Austen and Shakespeare. They're the pick of the litter.

Just so, P. G. Wodehouse stands supreme among the tribe of light, genial farceurs and literary entertainers of the early 20th century. And reading Earl Derr Biggers, a contemporary of his, explains why.

This novel is very good. The situation is just as complex as any Wodehouse concocted. But it clocks in at almost 9 hours. While very funny and loaded with memorable characters (the two vagrant newspaper men are perhaps the most endearing) this story just drags. It lacks the crispness and deft handling that Wodehouse would bring. In the hands of the Master, this novel might come in at about 5 hours. Nevertheless, it was still 9 hours well spent, as the stars above suggest.