The Girl Next Door - Softcover

Rendell, Ruth

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0385683332 ISBN 13: 9780385683333

Publisher: Doubleday Canada, 2014

Synopsis

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.
     '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 investigate a possible case of murder.
     In all her novels, Ruth Rendell digs deep beneath the surface to investigate the secrets of the human psyche. The interconnecting tunnels of Loughton in THE GIRL NEXT DOOR lead to no single destination. But the relationships formed there, the incidents that occurred, exert a profound influence -- not only on the survivors but in unearthing the true nature of the mysterious past.

About this title

About the Author:

RUTH RENDELL is crime fiction at its very best. Her first novel, From Doon With Death, appeared in 1964, and since then her reputation and readership have grown steadily with each new book. In 1996 she was awarded the CBE and in 1997 became a Life Peer. In 2013 she was awarded the Crime Writers' Association Cartier Diamond Dagger for sustained excellence in crime writing. Her books are translated into 21 languages.

Review:

“Ruth Rendell’s fiction clusters at such a high level that the best judgment I can render about The Girl Next Door is this: It’s a good Rendell, and that makes it very good indeed.”
—The Washington Post Book World

“One of the finest writers of her time. . . . Her wit, always mordant, has never been sharper than when she skewers patronizing assumptions about the ‘elderly’. . . . Perfect.”
—Chicago Tribune

“It’s an image that’s hard to forget: the severed but still clasped hands of two adulterous lovers, buried for years in a cookie tin. That’s Ruth Rendell for you, offering a vision that’s grim, grotesque and yet strangely beautiful. . . . Rendell makes clever work of a split time frame to transport her characters from the past to the present and back again. But her best, most idiosyncratic study is her portrait of the villain of the piece, a wicked man in his youth and an absolute devil in his dotage, determined to live to be 100 out of pure spite.”
—The New York Times Book Review

“Instead of exploring psychopathy as one might have expected, Rendell gives an acutely observed portrayal of old age through her characters' regrets, losses and bewilderment. Her realism renders the novel bleak at times but moving too. Difficult themes such as death, usually dressed up in mystery in a crime novel, are real, hard-hitting and constant.”
—The Guardian (UK)
 
“A satisfying mystery.”
—The Spectator (UK)
 
“Using her customary spare yet decorous style and measured pace, Rendell, now in her 80s, beautifully and carefully individualizes each member of her ensemble cast, at the same time creating not a grim reminder of mortality but a picture of moribund lives renewed. A special book by a special writer.”
—Booklist, starred review

“[Rendell] creates another riveting story with her sharp characterizations and keen sense of irony that will keep readers engaged from start to finish. Fans of psychological suspense, along with Rendell’s loyal following, will love this complex story.”
—Library Journal, starred review
 
“[An] assured novel of psychological suspense. . . . Rendell keeps the plot and the home fires burning.” —Publishers Weekly
 
“Rendell’s 65th novel shows the incalculable effects of a 70-year-old crime on a group of friends—schoolchildren when it happened, alarmingly unpredictable retirees now. . . . The sedate pace and sociological focus of Rendell’s recent work . . . [is] quickened here by the capacity of her golden agers to act, and act out, in ways as surprising as they are logical.” —Kirkus Reviews“The Girl Next Door is vintage Rendell and a perfect celebration of her half-century. . . . This novel . . . reminded me of the singularity of Ruth Rendell’s talent, her effortless mastery of language and her uncanny genius for mapping a criminal mind.”
—The Times (UK)

“Superb.... Fifty years on, the girl from Essex has become the unchallenged crime queen of suburbia. Her powers of observation are as acute as ever, and she writes about old age with as much gusto as any of the subjects she has tackled in her long career.”
—Sunday Times

“A joy to read.... Deeply satisfying.”
—Evening Standard

About this edition

• Publisher: Doubleday Canada
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 0385683332
• ISBN 13: 9780385683333
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 288