Goodbye Piccadilly, Farewell Leicester Square

by Arthur La Bern

With the last of his money disappearing, Dick Ramey sets out to borrow some from his ex-wife. What happens in the following few hours makes him the only possible suspect in a sex-murder he did not commit.

This relentlessly readable novel carries you from one memorable scene to another: a matrimonial agency where Ramey fills out an application form with amazing crudity; an overnight stay in a flophouse--and, on another night, a seedy hotel room to which Ramey has taken an amorous barmaid; a meeting in a London park that leads to a cover-up flight to Paris; a second murder, which is discovered through a sack of potatoes that has legs.

Ramey, in the words of one advance review, convicted " in a trial where the judge is hardly impartial, manages to escape...and then comes a real little shocker of an ending."

Genres: Fiction, Thriller, Mystery, Crime, London, British Literature

224 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1966

About the author

Arthur La Bern was a journalist with an interest in crime stories. He wrote a number of novels, as well as a couple of non-fiction books about famous murderers. La Bern's novel Goodbye Piccadilly, Farewell Leicester Square was the basis for Alfred Hitchcock's film Frenzy. The film It Always Rains on Sunday was based on the novel of the same name.

Reviews

[Bettie · Rating 4 out of 5]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWEFD...

Description: With the last of his money disappearing, Dick Ramey sets out to borrow some from his ex-wife. What happens in the following few hours makes him the only possible suspect in a sex-murder he did not commit.

This relentlessly readable novel carries you from one memorable scene to another: a matrimonial agency where Ramey fills out an application form with amazing crudity; an overnight stay in a flophouse--and, on another night, a seedy hotel room to which Ramey has taken an amorous barmaid; a meeting in a London park that leads to a cover-up flight to Paris; a second murder, which is discovered through a sack of potatoes that has legs.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frenzy

[Creolecat]

Frenzy (1972)

[CQM · Rating 3 out of 5]

A rare case of the film being better than the book but then it was Hitchcock. This book kept coming up with nice ideas and clever touches but never really follows through and the courtroom scenes are frankly boring enough to be true. Three stars for unfulfilled promise.

[Berna · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a weird book, I had trouble understanding the characters but the plot was sort of exciting.

[BVW · Rating 3 out of 5]

Endlessly grim and surprisingly graphic for its time, this novel served as the basis for Alfred Hitchcock's 1972 film, Frenzy. Originally titled Goodbye Piccadilly, Farewell Leicester Square, Frenzy was adapted for the big screen by the talented Anthony Shaffer (Sleuth, The Wicker Man); and, by the way, that film adaptation is superior to the novel in every way. However, since this is a book review, we'll skip over the film and get to the business at hand.

Richard Blamey, a luckless alcoholic and former war-hero, finds himself slumming it as a bartender in a noisy Covent Garden pub. Already disheartened by the prison cell suicide of a friend and fellow war veteran, Blamey loses an allegedly surefire bet on a horse race, rendering him penniless and even more miserable. In desperation, he pays a visit to his caring ex-wife who just happens to run a successful marital agency in the neighborhood. However, due to Blamey's drunkenness and self-loathing, a loud argument ensues in her office. A play-nice dinner with his generous ex finds Blamey a few pounds richer, if none the wiser. In many ways, he is an exceptionally stupid man. Things go from bad to worse as a psychopathic sex deviant appears to be shadowing Blamey's movements, gruesomely dispatching the women in his orbit. Naturally, Blamey, ever the hothead, becomes the prime suspect and a game of cat-and-mouse ensues with Blamey attempting to outwit and outrun the Murder Squad charged with finding him. Only one investigator harbors doubts about Blamey's guilt but none of his superiors are interested in hearing his theories: they want the case closed. Now. Meanwhile, the seemingly-normal serial killer, unhindered and unsuspected, continues to remain free to plot more mischief behind the scenes.

Frenzy is well-written enough but lacking in suspense, especially once the identity of the killer is revealed halfway through the book. The kills and sexual assaults are sufficiently graphic and repugnant to repel many readers: a few particularly descriptive passages almost feel like precursors to Bret Easton Ellis's 1991 shocker, American Psycho (though, admittedly, Ellis's book is vastly more disturbing). The not particularly bright Blamey makes a compelling antihero who is dislikable enough to make him hard to care about. And yet I did. That's why, after a numbingly dull courtroom drama plays out across way too many pages, I was furious when Blamey finds himself in a perilous situation and suddenly the book just stops. It doesn't end, it stops. Sort of like a French movie, it just stops right in the middle of what should be the climactic scene. The reader is left dangling. There is no satisfaction. There is no release. It is literary anorgasmia is what it is. At least Hitchcock's film offered a hint at closure. The only reason I am giving this book 3 stars instead of 2 is because the author clearly had talent, and the characters and plot are serviceably intriguing.

[Rob Smith, Jr. · Rating 2 out of 5]

I believe I've seen the film, 'Frenzy', by Alfred Hitchcock. As I recall, it's not considered one of his best. I would figure Hitchcock to make use of a better book. This is flimsy material for a director of the status of Hitchcock. Might explain his problems with the film.

There's so much potential here and poor plotting botches the whole. The novel starts off in a terrific direction, then the bad guy stuff starts. That's when, it seems, ls Bern loses his nerve and squanders great scenes with an odd effort of suspense and violence but does neither well. Then le Bern takes the main character on a journey that makes little sense. Later le Bern gets into litigious mode and goes on pages and pages and pages of legal babble from judge and lawyers and the book grinds to a halt and then a very unsatisfying ending.

Characters and setting all very well written. It's the rest that doesn't make worth turning pages.

Bottomline: I don't recommend this book. 4 out of 10 points.

[Ken French · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was reading that La Bern did not like the Anthony Shaffer screenplay for the Hitchcock film. Funny, since Shaffer did a much better job with this story than its original author. The book is redundant (we hear how Babs was killed three times: when it happens, when the prosecutor tells it, and when the judge addresses the jury); quite a lot for such a short book. The movie also dispenses with a superfluous trip to Paris. And finally, the ending of the movie is much more satisfying. Add Frenzy to the small number of movies that are better than the books they are based on.

[Rachel Stevenson · Rating 3 out of 5]

The basis of Hitchcock's penultimate film, Frenzy, it's easy to see why big Al liked this story of a man falsely accused of double femicide.

Less than the thriller, I was interested in post-war London and it's characters, the "tin gods" flying aces who had not settled into civvy street, even twenty years after the war. La Bern shows how things have changed (the police guarding a pop group from young fans, a character talks of "Coronation street accents") in a London that is just beginning to swing, although not for these characters - unless it's from a noose.

[Daniel Arrazola Barbosa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Frenesí detalla una cruda forma de relatar una historia negra. En ella, el autor Arthur La-Bern, desarrolla una llamativa novela que tiene como escenario el Londres Post-Guerra. Dick Blamey, un antiguo héroe de guerra, se verá envuelto como principal sospechoso de una serie de asesinatos que lo colocaran en la mira de las autoridades.

[R.K. Cowles · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 1/2 stars

[Melissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

#aroundtheyearin52books Top of TBR list

[Bill FromPA · Rating 2 out of 5]

Richard Blamey is a decorated RAF pilot who, twenty years after the war, is down on his luck: unemployed and homeless as this 1966 novel opens, within days he finds himself wanted by the police for two murders he did not commit. Detective-Superintendent Tim Oxford is uneasy about Blamey’s guilt despite the strong circumstantial evidence but he is unable to resist his superiors’ insistence on a speedy arrest.

The novel is written in serviceable prose, with the dialogue scenes being especially well done. Most of the last quarter of the book is taken up with Blamey’s trial where La Bern indulges himself by writing long speeches for the prosecutor and judge and a comical cross examination which bring the book’s momentum to a stop. In the last chapter the action picks up again, building to a fevered pace, but the book ends suddenly and inconclusively, so much so that I half suspect that a final chapter is missing from my edition (Stein and Day Book Club Edition, retitled “Frenzy”, so evidently published 1972 or later) though I haven’t been able to determine if this is in fact the case.

The book is sprinkled with references to English popular culture, many of which I found opaque. For the Anglophiles among my readers, here are 3 on which to exercise your knowledge:

He turned the knob another degree so that a noisy program of the Workers’ Playtime type burbled forth.

The trousers were a sober clerical grey but the sports jacket in Harris tweed looked like a cast-off from the stage attire of the late Mr. Max Miller.

For a week he drove up and down the A1 at all hours of the day and night, stopping at transport cafes between London and Grantham, then on to Newark-on-Trent and thence to Lincoln, having so many cups of tea at the various pull-ups that he was afraid he would begin to look like Dixon of Dock Green.

[Fishface · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent read. I love the way the author worked details of the Hammersmith Nudes Murderer, on whom this story is based, into the fiction. I also love the way he brought in so many other famous British criminals. But it's the story itself, pure fiction, that drags you along kicking and screaming at the unfairness of it all. Even if you don't normally like suspense thrillers, you should read this one.

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

Originally titled, "Goodbye Piccadilly Farewell Leicester Square," before Alfred Hitchcock adapted it for his movie "Frenzy." It's been a while but I remember it being an entertaining read, just as good as the film.

[Bill · Rating 4 out of 5]

LA Bern's 1966 novel is more famous as Alfred Hitchcock's 1972 film Frenzy. The story still holds up, although some of the dialogue is stilted in places. It becomes bogged down in the courtroom scenes, but the murders are well written for a book of this age.

[Mark Schomburg]

The coincidental timing of the plot is contrived, and it lacks most in the end because the antagonists motive is never fully explained. An explanation would have helped resolve the weird timing elements that lead the book.

[Edward Lengel · Rating 1 out of 5]

I kept waiting for the nastiness and cynicism to let up. It never did. Fairly effective writing talent wasted in dredging out the gutter.

[Althea · Rating 2 out of 5]

Disappointing. Interesting enough story; but I thought it jumped around a bit in time and left me trying to fill in the blanks.

[JoLynn · Rating 4 out of 5]

The basis for Hitchcock's movie 'Frenzy'

[Corey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Surprisingly good. This is the novel Hitchcock based his last great movie, 'Frenzy,' on. The novel differs from the movie in a few major ways but both are excellent.