THE WEST PIER

The first of a series of novels which gives all the unlovely particulars of the successful career of Ernest Ralph Gorse, a swindler. From his first misdemeanours in a boys' school, Gorse moves on the larger things in London where he picks up Esther Downes on the West Pier, a pretty girl of poor circumstances who has, however, a cache of some seventy pounds. Through some precise and persuasive moves, Gorse succeeds in discrediting his friend Hyan with Esther, who rather prefers the more personable Ryan, in securing her savings for the purchase of a car, and in ditching her in a hotel where she is left holding the bag- he had given her- without the price of the last tea they had shared together .... A metioulous and merciless scrutiny, closely observed in a record of greater precision than animation. Patrick Hamilton may well be remembered for the play Angel Street which became on the screen, and the earlier novel.