I don't often re-read a book, but I had to. I got to the end, went "I think I must've missed something. It seemed very clever and I wasn't paying enough attention." And sure enough, a second read through bumped this up from 3 to 3.5. I'll rate it 4 with the faith that Chesterton hid even more whimsy and satire that I still haven't found.

It's not as great as Chesterton's masterpiece The Man Who Was Thursday, not by a country mile. But it's still a delight, an impressive first novel, and the product of a cheeky mind: what if a war started between a man who treats being king as a joke, and another man who is dreadfully serious about his little slice of London?

Chesterton's first book definitely benefits from being eerily prophetic: published before WWI, when a thousand small hiccups fell into a bleak disaster, or even WWII and today, when larger-than-life personalities dragged us poor slobs into their psychoses. Either by a smart finger on history's repeating pulse or just dumb luck, good for him by managing to write a satire about things that hadn't happened yet.

It is missing a little 'oomph' and Chesterton is, as usual, a little too clever for his own good (there are intensely tangled sentences that punish you severely if you decide to skip them). Still, it's a charming read and not a waste of time. There's something I love about a king becoming a war correspondent to see what's going on in the battlefield, and he's instantly recognizable -- but folks let him do it anyway because why not?