New Releases by Ruth Rendell

« Un grand thriller urbain sur la solitude. » L’Express Le livre : Mary accepte de faire don de sa moelle osseuse pour sauver un inconnu atteint de leucémie. Cet acte généreux met un terme à sa liaison avec Alistair, qui ne supporte pas qu''elle ait subi une intervention chirurgicale pour aider un étranger. Mais l''homme qu''elle a sauvé tient à faire la connaissance de sa bienfaitrice. Drôle, tendre et sensible, Leo pourrait bien être l''âme sœur tant attendue. Mais Mary peut-elle se fier aux apparences ? Tout près d’eux, une menace rôde. Depuis quelque temps, des sans-abri se font assassiner et empaler sur les grilles qui bordent le jardin. Au comble de l’été caniculaire, la peur et l’angoisse s’installent peu à peu au sein de Regent’s Park. L’auteur : Ruth Rendell a été récompensée par quatre Golden Dagger de l’Association britannique des auteurs de romans policiers et un Diamond Dagger pour sa contribution exceptionnelle à ce genre littéraire. L’association des Mystery Writers of America lui a attribué à trois reprises l’Edgar Award ainsi que l’Ultimate Master Award pour l’ensemble de son œuvre. Pionnière dans le genre du roman psychologique à suspense, elle est célèbre pour sa subtile analyse de la société anglaise contemporaine. Elle est l’auteur de plus de soixante-dix ouvrages, traduits dans trente-deux langues. Plusieurs de ses œuvres ont été portées à l’écran. Ainsi les vingt-quatre enquêtes de l’inspecteur Wexford ont été adaptées pour la télévision par Meridian et diffusées sur la chaine britannique ITV : un succès qui a duré treize ans. Plus récemment, en France, François Ozon a adapté au cinéma Une nouvelle amie et Pascal Thomas La Maison du Lys tigré. Son roman Regent’s Park le sera prochainement. Commandeur de l’Empire britannique (CBE) depuis 1996 et pair à vie depuis 1997, Ruth Rendell vit à Londres, où elle consacre ses matinées à l’écriture, et assiste tous les après-midi aux séances de la Chambre des lords. Elle est particulièrement engagée dans la lutte contre l’illettrisme et défend activement les droits des femmes et des enfants.

From "unequivocally the most brilliant mystery writer of our time" (Patricia Cornwell), a new novel from Ruth Rendell writing as Barbara Vine, about a brother and sister involved with the same man in contemporary London.

“The heiress apparent to Agatha Christie.”—Los Angeles Times Chief Inspector Wexford is in China, visiting ancient tombs and palaces with a group of British tourists. Is he hallucinating, or does a bent old woman with bound feet follow him everywhere? Back in England, he is called to a nearby village where a wealthy woman has been found with a bullet in her head. Murdered. He identifies her as one of the China tourists, and soon decides to question the other members of the group. When he discovers the secrets they are hiding—greed, treachery, theft, adultery—he is forced to ask not who is innocent but who is the least guilty. “[Ruth] Rendell in top form, applying subtle psychological tints to the familiar mechanics of the police procedural . . . handsomely sculpted . . . Rendell proves once again her awesome skill at probing the criminal mind and conscience. . . . Handled with great originality.”—Philadelphia Inquirer

He was young, arrogant, wealthy and in the bloom of health—or was he? “Undoubtedly one of the best writers of English mysteries and chiller-killer plots.”—The Los Angeles Times Like any small community, Linchester has its intrigues: love affairs, money problems, unhappy marriages. But the gossip is elevated to new heights when young Patrick Selby dies on the very night of his beautiful wife’s birthday party. The whole neighborhood was there, witness to the horrible attack of wasp stings Patrick suffered at the end of the evening. But did Patrick die of a wasp sting? Dr. Greenleaf thinks not. Heart failure, more likely. Still, Greenleaf isn’t at peace about his death. After all, everyone in Linchester hated Patrick. With the help of a certain naturalist, Dr. Greenleaf begins to think about murder. . . . “Rendell is awfully good.”—The New York Times Book Review

Life in the well-manicured London locale of Hexam Place is not as placid and orderly as it appears. Behind the tranquil gardens and polished entryways, relationships between servants and their employers are set to combust. Henry, the handsome valet to Lord Studley, is sleeping with both the Lord''s wife and his university-age daughter. Montserrate, the Still family''s lazy au pair, is helping to hide Mrs. Still''s illicit affair with a television actor--for a small fee. June, the haughty housekeeper to a princess of dubious origin, is hard at work forming a "society" for servants to address complaints about their employers. Meanwhile, a disturbed gardener, Dex, believes a voice in his cellphone is giving him godlike instructions--that could endanger the lives of all who reside in Hexam Place. A deeply observed and suspenseful update to the upstairs/downstairs genre, The St. Zita Society is Ruth Rendell at her incisive best.

INCLUDES AN EXCERPT OF RENDELL’S FINAL NOVEL, DARK CORNERS This captivating novel about residents and servants on one block of a posh London street is a “sex comedy and a social satire, of the ‘Upstairs Downstairs’ variety, with a few murders mixed in for our added delight” (The Washington Post Book World). Life on Hexam Place appears orderly on the outside: drivers take their employers to and from work, dogs are walked, flowers are planted in gardens. But beneath this tranquil veneer, this quintessentially London world of servants and their masters is set to combust. Henry, the handsome valet to Lord Studley, is sleeping with both the Lord’s wife and his university-age daughter. Montserrat, the Still family’s lazy au pair, assists Mrs. Still in keeping secret her illicit affair with a television actor—in exchange for pocket cash. June, the haughty housekeeper to a princess of dubious origin, tries to enlist her fellow house-helpers into a “society” to address complaints about their employers. Meanwhile, Dex, the disturbed gardener to several families on the block, thinks a voice on his cell phone is giving him godlike instructions—commands that could imperil the lives of all those in Hexam Place.

INCLUDES AN EXCERPT OF RENDELL’S FINAL NOVEL, DARK CORNERS Diamond Dagger Award–winning Ruth Rendell has written a psychologically thrilling novel about the eccentric inhabitants of a London terrace, the secrets they keep, and what they will do to hide them. Is it dangerous to know too much about your neighbors? When Stuart Font decides to throw a housewarming party in his new flat, he invites all the people in his building—three flippant young girls, a lonely spinster, a man with a passion for classical history, and a woman determined to drink herself to death. After some deliberation, he even includes the unpleasant caretaker and his wife. He considered inviting a few other friends, but he definitely does not want his girlfriend, Claudia, in attendance, as he would also have to invite her lawyer husband. As it turns out, the party will be one everyone remembers. Living in a townhouse opposite Stuart’s building, in reclusive isolation, is a young, beautiful Asian woman known as Tigerlily. As though from some strange urban fairytale, she emerges infrequently to exert a terrible spell. And Stuart’s parents, always worried about their handsome, hopelessly naive, and undermotivated son, have even more cause for concern. Darkly humorous, piercingly insightful about human behavior, Ruth Rendell, whom People magazine calls “one of the most remarkable novelists of her generation,” has created an extraordinarily compelling story of our lives and crimes.

An “obsessively readable” mystery from the New York Times–bestselling author of Dark Corners about a century-old diary that holds clues to a murder (The Sunday Telegraph). Asta Westerby is lonely. In 1905, shortly after coming to East London from Denmark with her husband and their two little boys, she feels like a stranger in a strange land. And it doesn’t help that her husband is constantly away on business. Fortunately, she finds solace in her diary—and she continues to do so until 1967. Decades later, her granddaughter, Ann, finds the journal, and it becomes a literary sensation, offering an intimate view of Edwardian life. But it also appears to hold the key to an unsolved murder and the disappearance of a child. A modern masterpiece by the Edgar Award–winning author of the Inspector Wexford Mysteries, and an excellent choice for readers of P. D. James, Ian Rankin, or Scott Turow, Asta’s Book is at once a crime story, a historical novel, and a psychological portrait told through the diary itself and through Ann, who is bent on unlocking the journal’s excised mystery.

From an Edgar Award–winning author: Murder intrudes on a student’s secret history of the London Underground in this “brilliantly unexpected” mystery (The Times, London). Jarvis Stringer is a young man of many peculiarities, but no obsession has taken hold quite like that of writing the strange and twisting history of the London Underground. To finance his project, he rents out cheap rooms in the long-disused West Hampstead schoolhouse he inherited—a crumbling monument to morbid local lore. The boarders, each eking out their invisible lives above—and beneath—the city’s surface, are a collection of strays, waifs, subway buskers, and loners, who are raising the concern of Jarvis’s relatives and more proper neighbors. But even Jarvis has become suspicious. One of his outcasts may be a killer who’s plotting something unforgettable and catastrophic—and Jarvis himself has unwittingly become a conspirator. “A jolting novel of psychological suspense,” King Solomon’s Carpet was the recipient of the Crime Writers’ Association Gold Dagger Award (The New York Times Book Review).

An award-winning novel from a New York Times–bestselling author: The long-buried bodies of a woman and child are unearthed on a Suffolk country estate. When the new owners of Wyvis Hall, a rural estate in Suffolk, set out to bury their pet dog on the grounds, they stumbled upon a ghastly relic: the bones of a woman and small child in a shallow grave. The gruesome find makes stunning headlines, especially so for the previous occupants. A decade before, nineteen-year-old Adam Verne-Smith inherited the property and spent one debauched summer there with runaways, drifters, and his two best friends—none of whom have spoken since that fatal season. Adam is now a doting father and husband. His old buddy Rufus is a respectable doctor. And there’s Shiva, whose dreams of upward mobility drifted away. Unhinged by the discovery, they reunite, each with a protest of innocence. As the past slowly emerges, their regrets, desperation, and bitter incriminations get the best of them—and so will their secrets. A master of “deep, disquieting insight into the pathological dynamics of love” (The New York Times), author Ruth Rendell’s Crime Writers’ Association Gold Dagger Award–winning A Fatal Inversion is “rife with lost Edens, family secrets and stifled sexual urges” (Chicago Tribune). It was adapted for television by the BBC in 1992.

From a New York Times–bestselling author: A chilling psychological thriller about one man’s murderous obsession with his childhood sweetheart. Growing up in the roughest part of London, Guy Curran never imagined he would fall in love with a rich girl. But from the moment he meets Leonora Chisholm, he knows it’s their destiny to be together. They have a short, passionate teenage fling—over almost before it begins. Leonora moves on, but Guy never will. His love for her is dangerous, and it will destroy them both. Over the next ten years, Guy becomes a millionaire, selling hard drugs and bad art to the jet set of Western Europe. He and Leonora remain friends, sharing weekly lunches—until the day he learns she’s fallen in love with someone else. Seized by murderous jealousy, Guy is about to embark on a mad quest to claim the woman he desires—or die trying. “Rendell is a master of depicting the long, slow slide into madness” and Going Wrong shows her brilliant ability to walk the line between elegance and terror (Publishers Weekly).

Edgar Award Finalist: In this “mystery of the highest order,” a cheating husband vanishes and the women of Sussex aren’t giving up their secrets (The New Yorker). For London’s Chief Inspector Reg Wexford, it wasn’t an official call. He was just being neighborly when he agreed to talk to Joy Williams about her missing husband, Rodney. Apparently, he went to Ipswich on business and never came home. Wexford has an idea what happened: He most likely ran off with one of his girlfriends. However, there are a few nagging concerns, like Rodney’s suspicious letter of resignation and his abandoned car. And is it just a fluke that his disappearance coincides with a rash of stabbings—all straight through the heart, all with male victims. Wexford’s detective instincts must take flight in order to bring down a murderer. Or two. Or three. Because, behind the seemingly placid domesticity of his Sussex neighbors, there is a growing web of tangling secrets, double lives, and triple-crosses. “Rendell, winner of the Mystery Writers of America’s prestigious Edgar Award, is regarded as one of the top mystery writers working today. With An Unkindness of Ravens, she shows, once again, that reputation is well-deserved” (Los Angeles Times).

From a New York Times–bestselling author: A terrifying psychological thriller that dives deep into the mind of a sexual predator. In a remote corner of London, a woman is walking her dog when a man grabs her from behind. She screams, and her attacker flees, escaping into a nearby house, where he finds another victim. Victor Jenner has a compulsion he does not understand—to grab women, to hurt them—and he also has a gun. When it goes off, grievously wounding a police officer, it marks the beginning of a long stretch in jail for Victor. Released ten years later, Victor meets the young policeman he shot—and falls head over heels for the officer’s girlfriend. Back on the street, Victor is torn between the desire to live a better life and the knowledge that he will soon give in to his most evil yearnings. The winner of three Edgar Awards, Ruth Rendell was one of the most celebrated thriller authors of the twentieth century. Live Flesh is “a superb work [and] a compelling psychological portrait” of a dark mind (Philadelphia Daily News).

A lonely man stumbles into a dangerous game in this twisting novel of psychological suspense by the New York Times–bestselling author of The Crocodile Bird. In a desolate alley on the bank of the Thames, a spy slips through the shadows. Mungo is the Director General of English intelligence, and he knows Moscow Centre has been watching him for weeks, but there is no spy in London better at losing a tail. Satisfied he hasn’t been followed, he drops off his message and disappears into the night. It’s a classic scene of Cold War espionage, save for one detail: Mungo isn’t a spy at all. He’s a teenager, playing an epic game of make-believe. John Creevey, still reeling from the implosion of his marriage, is dreaming of taking revenge against his wife’s lover when he discovers one of Mungo’s coded signals. Unaware that the message is simply part of a child’s game, he becomes obsessed with uncovering the rest of the spy network—a tragic misunderstanding that threatens to turn this imaginary war into something very real—and very deadly. “Rendell has brilliantly interwoven these compelling strands into one masterful tale of suspense,” writes Library Journal. Three-time Edgar Award winner Ruth Rendell was a master of psychological suspense, and Talking to Strange Men is one of the most unusual espionage stories in the history of the Cold War.

A psychological thriller about an isolated young woman and her murderous mother from the New York Times–bestselling author of The Girl Next Door. Far from London, the isolated estate called Shrove House looms over the English countryside. Inside, two women hide from the world. For sixteen years, Eve has protected her daughter, Liza, from the corrupting influence of modern life, never letting her outside, hiding her from those who visit, and killing to keep her safe. Raised in her mother’s shadow, Liza has never questioned that this is the way things must be—until the night the police come to call, and Liza flees into the darkness. Alone in the world for the first time, terrified that her mother’s murderous past may catch up with her, Liza does what she can to survive. Taking shelter with the groundskeeper, Liza delves into her own past, telling the story of her traumatic childhood as a way of finding a place for herself in this strange, terrifying new world. But she will soon find herself wondering how much like her mother she really is . . . Joyce Carol Oates called Ruth Rendell “one of the finest practitioners of her craft in the English-speaking world.” In New York Times Notable Book The Crocodile Bird, this three-time Edgar Award winner shows the talent that made her one of the best.

A girl experiments with the occult to keep her family together in this psychological thriller from the New York Times–bestselling author of Dark Corners. In a quiet house in the London suburb of Manningtree, fifteen-year-old Pup and his emotionally damaged older sister, Dolly, have become closer than ever since the death of the their mother. Pup’s bookish obsession with witchcraft gives their disordered life a sense of purpose. Dolly isn’t sure what to expect from the talisman Pup makes her, until their father brings home a vulgar new wife. Then, Dolly, resentful and suddenly empowered, makes a deadly wish—the first of many. In a depressed neighborhood on the other side of town, a paranoid hermit has been questioned in a series of brutal murders. Lately, he’s taken to living in a tunnel behind a fort of mattresses, where he keeps his knives. Soon, his life and the lives of Pup and Dolly will converge. As one of them struggles toward something close to sanity, the other two will descend even further into darkness. “Only Rendell can show us how chillingly easy it is for ordinary people to slide into criminal behavior,” and in The Killing Doll, the tumble is relentless (Oprah.com). “Rendell, who perfected the art of the truly suspenseful psychological thriller” is a three-time recipient of the Edgar Award, and the author of numerous bestsellers (The Boston Globe).

Inspector Wexford searches for answers after an elderly woman is murdered in this “spellbinder” from a New York Times–bestselling author (Publishers Weekly). When Chief Inspector Wexford enters the parking garage, the woman is already dead, slumped between two cars, concealed under a velvet shroud. The inspector doesn’t even notice her as he drives away. Only later, when he sees on the news that an old woman was garroted in the shopping mall garage, does he realize how close he was to discovering the body. In a case that starts with a hidden corpse, the truth will be dangerously elusive. Before Wexford can sink his teeth into the elderly woman’s murder, he is nearly killed himself—by a politically motivated car bombing targeting his daughter. With the inspector in the hospital, the case falls to his partner, the intrepid Mike Burden, who must solve both mysteries before the shopping mall killer strikes again. The winner of three Edgar Awards, Ruth Rendell was one of the finest mystery authors of the twentieth century. Inspector Wexford was one of her most beloved creations, and The Veiled One is another “stunning” entry in the series (Publishers Weekly).

Inspector Wexford returns in his most surprising case yet "He had never told anyone. The strange relationship, if it could be called that, had gone on for years, decades, and he had never breathed a word about it. He had kept silent because he knew no one would believe him. None of it could be proved, not the stalking, not the stares or the conspiratorial smiles, not the killings, not any of the signs Targo had made because he knew Wexford knew and could do nothing about it." Wexford had almost made up his mind that he would never again set eyes on Eric Targo''s short, muscular figure. And yet there he was, back in Kingsmarkham, still with that cocky, strutting walk. Years earlier, when Wexford was a young police officer, a woman called Elsie Carroll had been found strangled in her bedroom. Although many still had their suspicions that her husband was guilty, no one was convicted. Another woman was strangled shortly afterwards, and every personal and professional instinct told Wexford that the killer was still at large. And it was Eric Targo. A psychopath who would kill again... As the Chief Inspector investigates a new case, Ruth Rendell looks back to the beginning of Wexford''s career, even to his courtship of the woman who would become his wife. The past is a haunted place, with clues and passions that leave an indelible imprint on the here and now.

She waits for him in the dark, her mind and body perfect, passive, until one day, when he goes to the cellar, and she is gone . . . In A Demon in My View, Ruth Rendell creates a character as frightening as he is fascinating. Mild-mannered Arthur Johnson has never known how to talk to women. And his loneliness has perverted his desire for love and respect into a carefully controlled penchant for violence. One floor below him, a scholar finishing his thesis on psychopathic personalities is about to stumble—quite literally—upon one of Arthur''s many secrets. Haunting and intelligent, A Demon in My View shows the startling results of this chilling alchemy of two very disparate minds—one pathological and the other obsessed with pathology.

The potent and murky impulses of desire, greed, obsession and fear combine with deadly results in this compelling psychological thriller from multi-million copy and SUNDAY TIMES bestselling author Ruth Rendell. Perfect for readers of PD James, Ann Cleeves and Donna Leon. ''A fine novel of suspense'' -- Financial Times ''Rendell''s psychological insights are so absorbing, it''s easy to forget what a superb plotter she is'' -- The Times ''Ruth Rendell''s books are not only whodunits but whydunits, uncovering the motive roots of murder'' -- Mail on Sunday ''Pretty much perfect'' -- ***** Reader review ''Had me glued from start to finish'' -- ***** Reader review ''Loved this book, a real page turner with a really good end!'' -- ***** Reader review ''A superb work which, as always, keeps you gripped from beginning to end!!'' -- ***** Reader review ********************************************************************************************* Alan Groombridge is trapped. Husband to a woman he doesn''t like, father to two children he never wanted, and manager of a tiny branch of the Anglian-Victoria bank, he is doomed to a life of domestic boredom and tedious routine. All that keeps him afloat is his one fantasy: stealing enough of the bank''s money to allow him just one year of freedom - one year in which to live a different sort of life. But one day the bank is robbed, the manager and cashier disappear and what was once a place of dull and dreary repetition becomes the scene of a brutal, chilling nightmare that might never end...

The first victim was discovered with a bite on her neck. The police traced the DNA to the girl’s boyfriend, but the tabloids had already dubbed the murderer “The Rottweiler,” and the name stuck. The latest body was found near Inez Ferry’s shop in Marylebone. Someone spotted a figure fleeing into the shadows, but couldn’t say even if it was a man or woman. The only other clues are the murderer’s penchant for strangling his prey, and then removing a small token — a necklace, a lighter. To make ends meet, widowed Inez Ferry takes in tenants above her antique store. The unpredictable and obsessive acts of the serial murderer begin to disturb the lives of the heterogeneous little community of lodgers, especially when suspicion grows that one of them might be “The Rottweiler.”

From the multi-award-winning author of The Babes in the Wood and The Rottweiler, a chilling new novel about obsession, superstition, and violence, set in Rendell’s darkly atmospheric London. Mix Cellini (which he pronounces with an ‘S’ rather than a ‘C’) is superstitious about the number 13. In musty old St. Blaise House, where he is the lodger, there are thirteen steps down to the landing below his rooms, which he keeps spick and span. His elderly landlady, Gwendolen Chawcer, was born in St. Blaise House, and lives her life almost exclusively through her library of books, so cannot see the decay and neglect around her. The Notting Hill neighbourhood has changed radically over the last fifty years, and 10 Rillington Place, where the notorious John Christie committed a series of foul murders, has been torn down. Mix is obsessed with the life of Christie and his small library is composed entirely of books on the subject. He has also developed a passion for a beautiful model who lives nearby — a woman who would not look at him twice. Both landlady and lodger inhabit weird worlds of their own. But when reality intrudes into Mix’s life, a long pent-up violence explodes.

From award-winning author Ruth Rendell – “without a doubt the grand dame of British crime fiction,” (The Gazette) – comes the chilling new Inspector Wexford novel. Searching for truffles in a wood, a man and his dog unearth something less savoury–a human hand. The body, as Chief Inspector Wexford is informed later, has lain buried for ten years or so, wrapped in a purple cotton shroud. The post mortem cannot reveal the precise cause of death. The only clue is a crack in one of the dead man’s ribs. Although the police database covers a relatively short period of time, it stores a long list of Missing Persons. Men, women and children disappear at an alarming rate–hundreds every day. So Wexford knows he is going to have a job on his hands to identify the corpse. And then, only about twenty yards away from the woodland burial site, in the cellar of a disused cottage, another body is discovered. The detection skills of Wexford, Burden, and the other investigating officers of the Kingsmarkham Police Force, are tested to the utmost to see if the murders are connected and to track down whoever is responsible.

Fans of PD James, Ann Cleeves and Donna Leon will devour this enthralling mystery of deception, doubt and death from multi-million copy and SUNDAY TIMES bestselling author Ruth Rendell ... ''Probably the greatest crime writer in the world'' -- Ian Rankin ''[Wexford] has become an old friend who gets better with age'' -- Herald ''Pacy and surprising right to the last page'' -- ***** Reader review ''You cannot go wrong with a Ruth Rendell'' -- ***** Reader review ''Extremely thrilling and entertaining'' -- ***** Reader review ''Full of twists and turns'' -- ***** Reader review ********************************************************************************** Sir Manuel Camargue, Kingsmarkham''s very own celebrity flautist, dies tragically on a snowy night. His death is met with a ruling of misadventure and appears to be an open-and-shut-case. However Wexford, as the investigating officer, has a few niggling doubts. Nineteen years later, Camargue''s entrancing daughter, Natalie, now a considerable heiress, suddenly reappears in Kingsmarkham. When her fiancé appeals to Wexford for help, believing that Natalie is using a false identity, the case of the Camargues is once more under investigation. Events soon take a gruesome twist and the pressure is on for Wexford to discover Natalie''s true identity and to solve the mystery of the Camargue family, once and for all.

Readers of PD James, Ann Cleeves and Donna Leon will love this gripping crime thriller full of twists and turns from multi-million copy and SUNDAY TIMES bestselling author Ruth Rendell. This edition has an introduction from Ian Rankin and an afterword by the author. ''If crime fiction is currently in rude good health, its practitioners striving to better the craft and keep it fresh, vibrant and relevant, this is in no small part thanks to Ruth Rendell.'' -- IAN RANKIN ''A classic mystery, as true to life now as it was half a century ago'' - MAIL ONLINE ''Ruth Rendell''s mesmerising capacity to shock, chill and disturb is unmatched'' - THE TIMES ''This is not just a crime novel, it is a wonderfully written novel with crime in it.'' -- ***** Reader review ''A real page turner.'' -- ***** Reader review ************************************************************ AN ORDINARY LIFE. AN EXTRAORDINARY DEATH. The trampled grass led to the body of Margaret Parsons. With no useful clues and a victim known only for her mundane life, Chief Inspector Wexford is baffled until he discovers Margaret''s dark secret - a collection of rare books, each inscribed from a secret lover and signed only as ''Doon''. Who is Doon? And could the answer hold the key to Wexford solving his first case?

A mutilated body found at a rock festival. In spite of dire predictions, the rock festival in Kingsmarkham seemed to be going off without a hitch, until the hideously disfigured body is discovered in a nearby quarry. And soon Wexford is investigating the links between a local girl gone bad and a charismatic singer who inspires an unwholesome devotion in his followers. Some Lie and Some Die is a devilishly absorbing novel, in which Wexford''s deductive powers come up against the aloof arrogance of pop stardom. With her Inspector Wexford novels, Ruth Rendell, winner of the Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Award, has added layers of depth, realism and unease to the classic English mystery. For the canny, tireless, and unflappable policeman is an unblinking observer of human nature, whose study has taught him that under certain circumstances the most unlikely people are capable of the most appalling crimes.

A young girl is murdered in a cemetery. And Wexford''s doctor has prescribed no alcohol, no rich food and, above all, no police work. When a young girl''s body is found in a London cemetery and the local police, under the command of Wexford''s nephew, are baffled, Wexford decides to brave his doctor''s wrath and the condescension of the London police by doing a little investigating of his own. A compelling story of mysterious identity and untimely death, Murder Being Once Done is Rendell at her most sublime. With her Inspector Wexford novels, Ruth Rendell, winner of the Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Award, has added layers of depth, realism and unease to the classic English mystery. For the canny, tireless, and unflappable policeman is an unblinking observer of human nature, whose study has taught him that under certain circumstances the most unlikely people are capable of the most appalling crimes.

What on earth could have provoked a modern day St. Valentine''s Day massacre? On Valentine''s Day, four members of the Coverdale family--George, Jacqueline, Melinda and Giles--were murdered in the space of 15 minutes. Their housekeeper, Eunice Parchman, shot them, one by one, in the blue light of a televised performance of Don Giovanni. When Detective Chief Superintendent William Vetch arrests Miss Parchman two weeks later, he discovers a second tragedy: the key to the Valentine''s Day massacre hidden within a private humiliation Eunice Parchman has guarded all her life. A brilliant rendering of character, motive, and the heady discovery of truth, A Judgement in Stone is among Ruth Rendell''s finest psychological thrillers.

Two things interest Stanley Manning: crossword puzzles, and the substantial sum his wife Vera stands to inherit when his mother-in-law dies. Otherwise, life at 61 Lanchester Road is a living hell. For Mrs. Kinaway lives with them now—and she will stop at nothing to tear their marriage apart. One afternoon, Stanley sets aside his crossword puzzles and changes all their lives forever... In One Across, Two Down, master crime writer Ruth Rendell describes a man whose strained sanity and stained reputation transform him from a witless loser into a killer afraid of his own shadow. Mischievously plotted, smart, maddeningly entertaining, One Across, Two Down is a dark delight—classic Rendell.

Martin Urban is a quiet bachelor with a comfortable life, free of worry and distractions. When he unexpectedly comes into a small fortune, he decides to use his newfound wealth to help out those in need. Finn also leads a quiet life, and comes into a little money of his own. Normally, their paths would never have crossed. But Martin’s ideas about who should benefit from his charitable impulses yield some unexpected results, and soon the good intentions of the one become fatally entangled with the mercenary nature of the other. In the Lake of Darkness, Ruth Rendell takes the old adage that no good deed goes unpunished to a startling, haunting conclusion.