Wolf to the Slaughter

Ruth Rendell is in top form as usual. She's such an excellent mystery writer, both she and P.D. James are top notch.

This is an early Rendell but still one of her very best. If you are a first time reader of hers or an older fan you will enjoy.

I'm a huge fan of Ruth Rendell no matter what she writes, so I am catching up with some Chief Inspector Wexford books that I have missed. This is an early one in the sereies, but it's a good one. No one does studies in human psychology like Ms. Rendell, and this book delves into the mind of a young and up and coming police officer, and the demons he fights when love interferes with an investigation. A girl has disappeared and Wexford, Burden and Drayton are trying to determine whether or not a murder has been committed even though there's no body. What they do uncover is a household full of some secrets and we know these secrets inexorably will affect young Drayton before the case is solved. Excellent story as well as a mystery.

Anita Margolis, young, beautiful, carefree, has vanished into thin air. She left her home to attend a party one wet evening, but has not been seen since. She is reported missing soon after by her brother, whom she shared a flat with, the acclaimed but eccentric artist Rupert Margolis. Inspector Burden quickly forms an impression of a wanton young girl simply gone off somewhere with a boyfriend having neglected to let anyone know. After all, she was that sort of woman, in Burden's opinion. However, Wexford has his doubts, and those doubts will soon be confirmed, and they will soon find themselves enmeshed in a case that will throw every assumption they make into doubt. This is an early Wexford book, and it is brilliant. A simple notion, but true. One of the best of the entire series, actually, the fact of its quality equally matches that of the novels she is still producing and marks her out clearly as possibly the most reliable and captivating novelist of her generation, such is her constant unfailing ability. She writes absolutely brilliantly, with an emotional detachedness that makes it so much more powerful when she decides that now is the time to probe in the darkness of a particular characters mind and motivations. And those characters are unendingly fascinating, completely human yet with a shadowy darkness to them, and flawlessly depicted.But it is not just her characters that mark her books out as special. Setting and story meld in equally with character in the most successful books to create a compelling whole, and Rendell accomplishes this with ease. The fictional Kingsmarkham is almost as tangible and atmospheric as the London she uses as the setting for some of her other non-Wexford novels. The reader feels they could easily be supplanted into the story, onto the streets of this fictional town, and yet already know its environs intimately. And then, of course, the story too is near-perfect. It is dark, it is clever, it is affecting, it is psychologically acute, it is realistic (despite the false idea that these kind of traditional procedural novels tend not to be), it is engrossing, as well as being a plethora of other laudable adjectives as well. It shifts and moves and surprises and has excellent pace, carrying the reader through on a breathless ride - secured in by the mesmeric hand-at-your-throat grip of the prose - until a tension-filled conclusion, which leaves more than one character irredeemably altered for life. Wolf to the Slaughter is simply yet another excellent novel from the woman who is, in my mind, the best writer in the world today. And that is all there is to it.

Ruth Rendell's Chief Inspector Wexford mysteries are important entries to the police procedural genre. This, the second of the series, is probably the book that cemented Rendell's decision to continue. The daughter of local artist Rupert Margolis hasn't been home in a few days, but her father isn't reporting her disappearance. No, instead, he is filling out inquirings for someone to help him manage his household in his daughter's stead! And then Wexford receives a note that says daughter Ann has been murdered, and the suspects name given. With his ever-present second in command Mike Burden, Wexford begins his investigation, characterized by methodical thinking and well-paced moving! The plot becomes ever so convoluted--but don't give up. Rendell is in complete charge (it's one of her longer Wexfords) and by the conclusion her logial thinking, clever plot execution, and expert character development have won the day. "Wolf to the Slaughter" is also perhaps one of Rendell's most suspense-filled books (of the Wexford series). A local hotel has been letting one of its rooms as a love nest, but when a man with a knife one evening gets through with it, it is a room of blood, violence, and death. But whose? There's no corpse to be found! Wexford and Burden take over and the pages turn automatically after this, as Rendell's heros leave no stone unturned--nor sheet unfurled! Rendell has published many other books that are not in the series (she also writes under the name of Barbara Vine) and, with each, she clearly knows what she's writing about--she's a master here. And the surprise ending is handled masterly, too! ([email protected])