Forgotten Book - The Third Skin

The Third Skin was John Bingham's third novel, appearing in 1954 (in the US, the paperback edition was called Murder is a Witch). It's a little-known book, having received only limited coverage over the years. This is surprising, because Bingham's first two novels were well-regarded, and this one is certainly up to standard. It also marked a departure from his early books, which contained much fictionalised autobiography, and were narrated in the first person.

This is a story about a naive and weak-willed youth, Les Marshall, who works in a newspaper office and gets himself mixed up with a gang of youths with disastrous results. Les falls for Hester, the girlfriend of his pal Ron Turner, and finds himself lured into a trap, collaborating with Ron on a burglary which goes tragically wrong. And gradually the spotlight shifts away from clueless Les, and on to his mother, the resourceful widow Irene. It's a study of character as well as of crime, and as so often with Bingham, it offers an account of relentless police interrogation, this time with a sympathetic and well-rounded presentation of the lead detective, Vandoran.

The book is discussed in Michael Jago's enjoyable biography of Bingham, The Man Who Was George Smiley, and Jago makes the point that Bingham really didn't know anything about teenage gangs. That's true, and arguably it's a flaw in the story. But I don't know much about gangs either, and really I felt that Bingham's lack of first-hand knowledge wasn't a significant disadvantage. Hester, presumably the witch of the alternative title, is portrayed in a fairly superficial way, but Les is all too believable. There is also some excellent comedy in Bingham's presentation of Irene's friends, Gwen and Frederick Perry.

Although Jago doesn't mention it, I feel almost sure that Bingham's original idea for the story came from the circumstances of the Craig and Bentley case, in which a weak young man was hanged for a murder committed by his pal. Derek Bentley was, to an extent, the model for Les Marshall. The way he develops the idea, and in particular the passages dealing with Irene and her circle, is pleasing and reasonably original. As a result, suspense builds all the way to the end of the book. This is an under-rated novel, which I was very glad to read.

Forgotten Book - Deadly Picnic

John Bingham was in his early 70s, yet commendably trying for a fresh direction in his writing, when he published Deadly Picnic in 1980. Michael Jago's excellent biography of Bingham, The Man Who Was George Smiley, suggests that Bingham was trying to follow in the footsteps of Colin Dexter with this one, although his detective duo, King and Owen, were about as different from Morse and Lewis as could be imagined.

At the start of the book, King and Owen are getting on like a house on fire, and Owen seems set to replace King when he retires. But at a picnic with their wives, Owen is offended by King's wife Laura, and an estrangement develops. King learns that Owen isn't going to get his job, and steps down from the Met at once, improbably taking a job with a marriage bureau. We then learn, perhaps even more unexpectedly, that Owen has a drug habit.

King is concerned that a criminal called Buller is determined to exact revenge after being sent to prison. And it just so happens that Buller is threatening the woman who set up the marriage bureau. King soon concludes that he needs to kill Buller, who is admittedly a nasty piece of work. So he tries to plan the perfect murder.

Of course, things don't work out as expected. But long before the sadly foreseeable twist ending, the reader has ceased to care. Jago described this book as a "disaster", which killed Bingham's relationship with his then publishers, Macmillan. It's certainly an unsatisfactory piece of work, which seems to have been written in an increasingly perfunctory fashion. I'm afraid that the characters didn't ring true, and the plot didn't appeal to me. I like Bingham as a writer, and feel that he is seriously under-estimated nowadays, but alas, this book is the work of a man whose powers were in sad decline.

The Man Who Was George Smiley

The Man Who Was George Smiley is a very good title for a new book by Michael Jago, published by Biteback, which is sub-titled The Life of John Bingham. Bingham's claim to fame - you've guessed it! - is that he was the spy whom John Le Carre used as a model for Smiley. Interesting in itself. But more interesting to me is that Bingham was a successful writer of crime novels and espionage stories, and I was glad to learn more about him, as well as about his work.

Due to Julian Symons' advocacy, I read many years ago Bingham's debut novel My Name is Michael Sibley, a story told from the point of view of an innocent man accused of crime. It's a strong and original story, and I'm really not sure why I've seldom read Bingham since. But Jago's book has definitely encouraged me to do so.

Jago gives a good and readable account of Bingham's life, and does not flinch from the rift that developed between Bingham and Le Carre. Bingham's wife was especially unhappy with Le Carre, and it's intriguing and rather sad to read about how their relationship deteriorated. Part of the problem was no doubt jealousy of Le Carre's critical and financial success, which far outstripped Bingham's. It's always a huge mistake to be jealous of others. Yet Jago suggests there were faults on Le Carre's side too, and that is probably right.

I enjoyed reading the sections about Bingham's own books, and his relationship with Victor Gollancz, one of the most brilliant of all British publishers. I suspect that Jago is not really a detective fiction fan, as there is little here that connects Bingham with the wider genre, or his place in it. Sir John Masterman, for instance, a spy of distinction, is mentioned, but his detective novels are not. The Detection Club, of which Bingham was a long-standing member, as was Masterman, isn't mentioned, one more frustration for its archivist. But I liked this book, which has made me want to read more of Bingham's work, and that's a sign of a good literary biography.