Ruth Rendell

When a housekeeper carries out a modern "Valentine's Day Massacre" on the family that employs her, Detective Chief Superintendent William Vetch investigates to uncover evidence of a personal tragedy that precipitated the crime. Reprint.

A Judgement in Stone

In a new edition of the classic debut novel featuring the inimitable Inspector Wexford, the clever detective investigates the baffling demise of Margaret Parsons, a timid housewife, whose body turns up in the woods, brutally strangled, until his probe uncovers Margaret's secret treasure trove of rare books, given to her by a passionate lover known only as Doon. Reprint. 20,000 first printing.

The First Inspector Wexford Novel

From Doon with Death

"Dazzling...writing at her formidable best, Barbara Vine taps the poetry as well as the pain of her characters' clamorous declarations of their need for love." —New York Times Book Review "When the best mystery writer in the English-speaking world launched a second byline, she actually stepped up her writing a level." —TIME Faith Severn has grown up with the dark cloud of murder looming over her family. Her aunt Vera Hillyard, a rigidly respectable woman, was convicted and hanged for the crime, but the reason for her desperate deed died with her. Thirty years later, a probing journalist pushes Faith to look back to the day when her aunt took knife in hand and walked into a child's nursery. Through the eyes of a woman trying to understand an unspeakable, inexplicable family tragedy, Barbara Vine leads us through a shadow land of illicit lust, intimate sins, and unspoken passions—to a shattering and illuminating climax, as inevitable as it is unexpected. In this enthralling masterpiece, a great crime writer has achieved both a flawlessly crafted novel of psychological suspense and a deeply probing work of literary art.

A Dark-Adapted Eye

The chilling tale of a mother and daughter living alone on an isolated estate is the story of a daughter totally protected from the outside world--but not from her mother's murderous obsessions. Reprint.

The Crocodile Bird

"When his father dies, Carl Martin inherits a house in an increasingly rich and trendy London neighborhood. Carl needs cash, however, so he rents the upstairs room and kitchen to the first person he interviews, Dermot McKinnon. That was colossal mistake number one. Mistake number two was keeping his father's bizarre collection of homeopathic "cures" that he found in the medicine cabinet, including a stash of controversial diet pills. Mistake number three was selling fifty of those diet pills to a friend, who is then found dead. Dermot seizes a nefarious opportunity and begins to blackmail Carl, refusing to pay rent, and creepily invading Carl's space. Ingeniously weaving together two storylines that finally merge in one shocking turn, Ruth Rendell describes one man's spiral into darkness--and murder--as he falls victim to a diabolical foe he cannot escape."--

A Novel

Dark Corners

A fading beauty has resorted to seducing workmen in her palatial home, but when she sets her sights on craftsman Teddy Brex, the tired pattern of her life shifts from pathetic to deadly. Reprint.

A Sight for Sore Eyes

"The dazzling new novel from Ruth Rendell. When the bones of two severed hands are discovered in a box, an investigation into a long buried crime of passion begins. And a group of friends, who played together as children, begin to question their past. b> For Woody, anger was cold. Cold and slow. But once it had started it mounted gradually and he could think of nothing else. He knew he couldn't stay alive while those two were alive. Instead of sleeping, he lay awake in the dark and saw those hands. Anita's narrow white hand with the long nails painted pastel pink, the man's brown hand equally shapely, the fingers slightly splayed.' Before the advent of the Second World War, beneath the green meadows of Loughton, Essex, a dark network of tunnels has been dug. A group of children discover them. They play there. It becomes their secret place. Seventy years on, the world has changed. Developers have altered the rural landscape. Friends from a half-remembered world have married, died, grown sick, moved on or disappeared. Work on a new house called Warlock uncovers a grisly secret, buried a lifetime ago, and a weary detective, more preoccupied with current crimes, must

The Girl Next Door

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 revealt

Not in the Flesh

Barbara Vine

Inheriting their late grandmother's sprawling, book-filled home in London, siblings Grace and Andrew Easton move in together and initially enjoy a shared life that is complicated by Andrew's gay relationship with a strident novelist, the shattering murder of a friend and Grace's discovery of a long-lost manuscript. By an Edgar Award-winning author. 40,000 first printing.

The Child's Child

Dubbed the "Tancred House massacre," a triple murder in an elegant Kingsmarkham home baffles Chief Inspector Wexford as he tries to catch the demented killer before he strikes again. Reprint.

Kissing the Gunner's Daughter

When a superstitious nurse in a rural old-age home reveals her relationship with a married man to a patient, she is given the key to a secret cottage that also unlocks a door into the patient's terrifying past. Reprint.

The Brimstone Wedding

Louise North doesn't care what the neighbors think. She lets her lover leave his car just outside her house in broad daylight, telling everyone a cockamamie story about him being a central heating salesman. Still, it's a shock when she's found shot dead, covered by the equally dead body of the "salesman." Now Susan Townsend -- the Norths' next-door neighbor, who discovers the bodies -- must help Louise's husband, Bob, get back on his feet. But is she helping a neighbor . . . or a murderer?

The Secret House of Death

Chief Inspector Wexford investigates the murder of a flashy truck driver whose body was found floating in the river.

The Best Man to Die

When his cleaning lady, a notorious busybody, discovers the dead body of female vicar Sarah Hussein, who was strangled in her Kingsmarkham vicarage, Inspector Wexford assists in the investigation and stumbles upon a crucial piece of evidence that sheds new light on the deceased's dark past.

An Inspector Wexford Novel

No Man's Nightingale

A young, aristocratic woman from London volunteers to donate bone marrow to save the life of a homeless man, while a vicious stalker in the city's Regents Park terrorizes its dwellers in a shockingly brutal fashion

A Novel of Suspense

The Keys to the Street

A young bride's nightly walks in the forest turn deadly.

A Guilty Thing Surprised

In the quiet Sussex country town of Kingsmarkham, the daughter of Nigerian physician Raymond Akande is missing. "It's probably nothing," says Dr. Akande to his friend and client Chief Inspector Wexford, whose help he enlists. But the days that follow prove the doctor dreadfully wrong. A young woman is found murdered not Melanie, but the last person to have seen and spoken to her. A second woman's body is discovered, again not Melanie's, but like her, young and black. A third woman turns up beaten and unconscious; like the others, she is of Nigerian origin. As Inspector Wexford's investigation stretches from days into weeks, it becomes his unhappy obligation to counter the hopes of the doctor and his wife. In Wexford's professional opinion, Melanie, like the other young women, has become the victim of a serial killer with a horrifyingly singular objective. "From the Paperback edition.

Simisola

Agreeing to talk to Joy Williams about her missing husband, Detective Inspector Wexford thinks he is merely doing a neighborly good deed. Instead, he learns of a militant feminist group called The Ravens, and must investigate a homicide.

An Unkindness of Ravens

Psychological insights are shared in tales about guilt and recrimination, obsessive fears, and mental derangement.

Stories

The Fallen Curtain

The psychologically charged affairs between residents and servants on a posh London street escalate to violence involving a handsome valet who is sleeping with a lord's wife and daughter, an au pair who accepts fees for aiding her mistress' affair and disturbed gardener who believes he is receiving instructions from a god on his cellphone. By the Edgar Award-winning author of Tigerlily's Orchids. 50,000 first printing.

Ruth Rendell

Books

Your next favorite book is out there