Goodbye, Mickey Mouse (Unknown Binding)

by Len Deighton (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review
'It is a novel of memory, satisfying on every imaginable level, but truly astonishing in its recreation of a time and place through minute detail. Deighton has written well of the air before, nonfictionally, and he informs us in an after-word that it took six years of research to do this novel. It shows. The only way you could know more about flying a P-51 Mustang, after reading this book, is to have flown one.' Washington Post 'He writes, as usual, with authority and a superb sense of period' Daily Telegraph 'The sheer charge of the writing swept me into another world all the while I was reading, and now that piece of the past is a piece in my mind.' HRF Keating, The Times 'A master of fictional espionage.' Daily Mail 'The poet of the spy story.' Sunday Times 'For sheer readability he has no peer' The Standard --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Description
ENGLAND 1944

In Goodbye Mickey Mouse, Len Deighton has written his best novel yet: a brilliant, multidimensional picture of what it is to be at war ... and what it was to be in love in the England of 1944. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Unknown Binding: 551 pages
• Publisher: G.K. Hall; Book Club (BCE/BOMC) edition (1983)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0816135444
• ISBN-13: 978-0816135448
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #5,358,382 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars From one of the best writers, one of his best, November 6, 1999

By	Doug Briggs (Houston, TX USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Goodbye Mickey Mouse (Mass Market Paperback)

Fifteen years after reading this splendid, poignant story I still choke up thinking about it. Len Deighton is unknown to many readers of even truly good literature -- partly because he took his time to do a craftsmanlike job and therefore didn't turn out a stream of quickies to keep himself constantly on the shelves.

I'm a pilot with 11,000 hours of flight time, some in fighters. I finished Goodbye Mickey Mouse convinced that Len Deighton was a WWII fighter pilot. Only a pilot, I thought, could describe to the satisfaction of another pilot the feel of the stick when a plane is approaching a high-speed stall, the feedback a pilot gets when his plane is damaged or a system has failed -- how he goes about trying to nurse the crippled bird home, sometimes successful and sometimes not . . . Then I read his explanation in the back of the book wherein he describes that he read 200 odd books on the subject of flying fighter airplanes in order to be able to write about it with credibility that satisfied himself.

Goodbye Mickey Mouse begins with a scene that dislocates your perception of how this story will conclude. At the very end he clears up your misperception in the most moving and satisfying way.

This is a story of real airmen, their distinctive personalities laid bare, buddies all, men who must accept the loss of buddy after buddy, but who manage to have some fun in the air and on the ground. There is real romance here, the kind Deighton is noted for -- sensitive for the most part but hilarious at times.

A fine read for discriminating readers, exciting, suspenseful, sad and haunting . . .

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The love of flying, the lovers of flyers, February 7, 2001

By	"michaeleve" (Miami, Florida) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

This review is from: Goodbye Mickey Mouse (Mass Market Paperback)

The book starts and ends in the same place - an abandoned and overgrown WWII fighter base in England in 1982. A group of American ex-servicemen are visiting their former base where 40 years ago they flew their Mustangs, fought the enemy, made friends, found themselves, and for our two central characters, fell in love.

The story centers on two Mustang pilots, Jamie Farebrother and Mickey Morse - nicknamed Mickey Mouse as in the quote "Goodbye Mickey Mouse", said by whom and in what context provides the poignant and emotionally powerful conclusion to the book. There are also two British women - the somewhat sheltered but nevertheless self assured Victoria Cooper who falls in love with Jamie and the married Vera Hardcastle who goes for Mickey. They are not in the book simply as the loves of the pilots, they are well developed characters and central to the plot of the story.

Besides developing the romance between these couples, other relationships Deighton explores are those between father and son, parent and child, military professionalism and discipline and human compassion and caring. It's all subtle though and does not in any way make this a weighty book. It's a good, fun, easy, straightforward read with the best examples of Deightons writing prowess in the detailed descriptions of the aerial battles. The visual pictures created by his words are so strong you'll be convinced he is writing from personal experience (you'll be wrong). Make that your only mistake and do not pass on this Deighton classic.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Life "Over There" during World War II, April 15, 2005

By	Andrew W. Johns "ResQgeek" (Alexandria, VA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Goodbye Mickey Mouse (Mass Market Paperback)

This is a terrific book about life in England during World War II, and some of the men who fought it. We meet the American officers at an Army Air Force fighter base, and learn what life was like for these flying warriors and the women they loved. From the high tension of flying combat missions to the rowdy parties where the men try to forget their fears, we get a glimpse of how the war affected these men and how they tried to cope. The characters are vividly portrayed, and we find much to like and dislike about all of them. In the end, they all show themselves to be falible humans. The ending provided a bit of a surprise, further illustrating the unpredictability of war.