Ruth Rendell

"Mystery novel about friendship, love, and aging. Synopsis: In the wanting months of the second World War, a group of children discover an earthen tunnel in their neighborhood. Throughout the summer of 1944--until one father forbids it--the subterranean space becomes their "secret garden," where the friends play games and tell stories. Six decades later, beneath a house on the same land, construction workers uncover a tin box containing two skeletal...

“Ruth Rendell is the best mystery writer in the English-speaking world.”—Time
No one admitted to spotting the doctor's missing daughter—even after the murders began. Melanie Akande, eschewing privilege, had insisted on going to the jobsearch office to find employment. But between that office and the bus stop, she vanished. Inspector Wexford hoped someone would have noticed her, since the Akandes were among...

Winner of multiple Edgar and Gold Dagger awards including the most prestigious Edgar of them all, the Grand Master, Ruth Rendell returns with a novel that pits Chief Inspector Wexford against a quite personal foe: the environmental terrorists who kidnap and threaten the lives of five hostages—including Wexford's own wife.
As Road Rage begins, Chief Inspector Wexford is walking through Framhurst Great Wood, just outside his beloved town of Kingsmarkham,...

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....

When Ismay thinks of that terrible day, and she often does, she remembers Heather coming down the stairs–her dress wet, her face as still and white as a porcelain mask. Sometimes the memories return in a dream: climbing the stairs, following her dripping-wet sister to the upstairs bathroom–but when Heather opens the door they are standing in a marble chamber on the edge of a glassy lake. Ismay watches as a white thing floats toward them,...

Rodney Williams' disappearance seems typical to Chief Inspector Wexford—a simple case of a man running off with a woman other than his wife. But when another woman reports that her husband is missing, the case turns unpleasantly complex.

Rodney Williams' disappearance seems typical to Chief Inspector Wexford—a simple case of a man running off with a woman other than his wife. But when another woman reports that her husband is missing,

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"When Stuart Font decides to throw a house-warming party in his new flat, he invites all the people in his building. He even includes the unpleasant caretaker and his wife. 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 Tigerlilly. As though from a strange urban fairytale, she emerges infrequently to exert a terrible spell....

At first there was no reason to link the killings. The first one, months earlier, seemed totally random: a lump of concrete pushed off an overpass onto a passing car. By contrast, the gruesome bludgeoning death of Amber Marshalson, returning home late from a night out clubbing with friends, was obviously calculated. The killer had been seen waiting for the girl in a nearby wood. But when Chief Inspector Wexford discovers that Amber had been the driver...

There hadn't been anything like this kind of rain in living memory. The River Brede had burst its banks, and not a single house in the valley had escaped flooding. Even where Wexford lived, higher up in Kingsmarkham, the waters had nearly reached the mulberry tree in his once immaculate garden. The Subaqua Task Force could find no trace of Giles and Sophie Dade, let alone the woman who was keeping them company, Joanna Troy. But Mrs. Dade was still

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Mopsa, driven by a past scarred by madness and violence. Benet, stricken by the most grievous loss any woman can bear. Carol, trapped in a life of crushing drabness no lover can change. Three mothers joined by a single thread of terror, whirled into a spiral of kidnapping, murder, and a final, reckless affirmation of love.