Book description
London 1939, and in the grimy publands of Earls Court, George Harvey
Bone is pursuing a helpless infatuation with Netta who is cool,
contemptuous and hopelessly desirable to George. George is adrift in
hell, until something goes click in his head and he realizes that he
must kill her.
Patrick Hamilton was one of the most gifted and admired writers of
his generation. Born in Hassocks, Sussex, in 1904, he and his parents
moved a short while later to Hove, where he spent his early years. He
published his first novel, Craven House, in 1926 and within a
few years had established a wide readership for himself. Despite
personal setbacks and an increasing problem with drink, he was able to
write some of his best work. His plays include the thrillers
Rope (1929), on which Alfred Hitchcock's film of the same name
was based, and Gas Light (1939), also successfully adapted for
the screen (1939), and a historical drama, The Duke in Darkness
(1943). Among his novels are The Midnight Bell (1929); The
Siege of Pleasure (1932); The Plains of Cement (1934); a
trilogy entitled Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky (1935);
Hangover Square (1941); The Slaves of Solitude (1947);
and The West Pier (1951), Mr Stimpson and Mr Gorse
(1953) and Unknown Assailant (1955), which together comprise
The Gorse Trilogy.
J. B. Priestley described Patrick Hamilton as uniquely individual
... He is the novelist of innocence, appallingly vulnerable, and of
malevolence, coming out of some mysterious darkness of evil.' Patrick
Hamilton died in 1962.
