Joseph Delaney used to be an English teacher, before becoming the best-selling author of the Spook's series, which has been published in 30 countries and sold over 4.5 million copies worldwide. The first book, The Spook's Apprentice, was adapted into a major motion picture starring Jeff Bridges and Julianne Moore.

Joseph Delaney

PublicationStatus

Brand

Format

AgeRange

Series

Imprint

CategoryLabel

P.G. Wodehouse

'I like that young man. He is sound on pigs. He has his head screwed on the right way.' 
 
The Empress of Blandings, prize-winning pig and all-consuming passion of Clarence, Ninth Earl of Emsworth, has disappeared. 
 
Blandings Castle is in uproar and there are suspects a-plenty - from the scandalous memoirist Galahad Threepwood to the Efficient Baxter, and the chilling former secretary to Lord Emsworth. Even Beach the Butler seems deeply embroiled. And what of Sir Gregory Parsloe-Parsloe, Clarence's arch-rival and neighbour, whose own pig competes with the Empress for local glory? 
 
With the castle full or imposters and deception around every corner, how will the Earl ever get to the bottom of the disappearance of the castle's most precious occupant? 
 
'Wodehouse is so utterly, properly, simply funny' Adele Parks 
 
'Line for line, no other author brings me as much pleasure' Joe Dunthorne

Summer Lightning

(Blandings Castle)

Dive into this collection of laugh-out-loud funny short stories from the perennial comic P. G. Wodehouse. 
 
Meet Clarence, the absent-minded ninth Earl of Emsworth, whose beloved pig the Empress of Blandings is in the running for her first prize in the Fat Pigs Class at the Shropshire Agricultural Show. Revel in the delicious feud between Head Gardener McAllister and the terrifying Lady Constance, which can only be solved by a delightfully rebellious little girl from London. And skipping an ocean and a continent, indulge in unputdownable stories of excess from the monstrous Golden Age of Hollywood, specially selected by Wodehouse himself. 
 
'P. G. Wodehouse is the funniest person that has ever written words' Greg James 
'An incomparable and timeless genius' Kate Mosse

Blandings Castle and Elsewhere

A Blandings novel 
 
When the moon is full at Blandings, strange things happen: among them the commissioning of a portrait of The Empress, twice in succession winner in the Fat Pigs Class at the Shropshire Agricultural Show. What better choice of artist, in Lord Emsworth's opinion, than Landseer. The renowned painter of The Stag at Bay may have been dead for decades, but that doesn't prevent Galahad Threepwood from introducing him to the castle - or rather introducing Bill Lister, Gally's godson, so desperately in love with Prudence that he's determined to enter Blandings in yet another imposture. Add a gaggle of fearsome aunts, uncles and millionaires, mix in Freddie Threepwood, Beach the Butler and the gardener McAllister, and the moon is full indeed.

Full Moon

'Without at least one impostor on the premises, Blandings Castle is never itself' 
 
Welcome to the world of the delightfully dotty Lord Emsworth, his bone-headed younger son and his long-suffering secretary. 
 
Having returned home with a valuable Egyptian amulet, Lord Emsworth finds his home contains not one but two imposters intent on taking it off his hands. But with no real sense of how the amulet came to be in his pocket in the first place, things get a lot more complicated very quickly...

Something Fresh

A Blandings novel 
 
Can the Empress of Blandings win the Fat Pigs class at the Shropshire Show for the third year running? Galahad Threepwood, Beach the butler and others have put their shirt on this, and for Lord Emsworth it will be paradise on earth. But a substantial obstacle lurks in the way: Queen of Matchingham, the new sow of Sir Gregory Parsloe Bart. Galahad knows this pretender to the crown must be pignapped. But can the Empress in turn avoid a similar fate? 
 
In this classic Blandings novel, pigs rise above their bulk to vanish and reappear in the most unlikely places, while young lovers are crossed and recrossed in every room in Blandings Castle.

Pigs Have Wings

'P. G. Wodehouse wrote the best English comic novels of the century' Sebastian Faulks 
 
'Witty and effortlessly fluid. His books are laugh-out-loud funny' Arabella Weir 
 
Welcome to Blandings Castle - where there's always something going on and a rollicking good time to be had. In this collection of assorted stories, dive into the wonderful world of Wodehouse where a comedy of errors awaits at every turn. Meet the regulars at Blandings: the engagingly dotty Lord Emsworth, his terrifying sister Lady Constance and his secretary the Efficient Baxter, whose attempts to bring order to the castle always end in disarray. And revel in the hijinks galore that come with the addition of lovestruck young men, headstrong young women, iron-willed aunts and imposters roaming the grounds - not to mention the Empress of Blandings, Lord Emsworth's prized pig.

The World of Blandings

biblio.categories.code

biblio.publicationStatus

biblio.brand

biblio.workEditions.format

biblio.ageRange

biblio.series.seriesName

biblio.imprint.description

biblio.type

About us

About Us (Header 4)

Best-Jane-Austen-quotes_Online-Desktop_Penguin

James-Baldwin

Marian-Keyes

haruki-murakami-320×320-1

Richard-Osman

Malorie Blackman

Lisa-Jewell

Charlie-Mackesy

Authors (Header 3)

Children&#039;s

Company

Discover

Fiction

Non-fiction

Penguin Classics

Penguin Shop (Header 5)

Useful links

Work with us

Search Results

The Fall of the West

Hunt the Villain

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Fight or Flight (Book 21)

The Mortons

Watch a trailer for The Spook's Blood

A photograph of Ben Barnes in character for Shadow and Bone Netflix series.

Interviews

Shadow and Bone’s Ben Barnes on tear-jerking books and what he’s reading

An image showing a selection of adventure stories for 9-12 year olds on a bright yellow background with orange doodles that include a hashtag, flag, danger sign and speech bubble

Children's reading lists

16 books for 9 to 12-year-olds that love adventures

An image of a selection of books for 9-12s on a blue background with a large splodge and striped print

24 must-read books for 9-12-year-olds

A picture of several different children's books on a pink to blue ombre background; each book has a bright yellow shadow

Reading lists

The 100 best children's books of all time, as chosen by our readers

stemming

Showing results for: ‘joseph delaney’

Filters

Category

Publication Date

Format

Series

Imprint

Follow penguin

Follow ladybird

Follow puffin

Sign up to the Penguin newsletter