Book description
The twenty-second book to feature the classic crime-solving
detective, Chief Inspector Wexford.
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 of her
violent murder, 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 that it was Eric Targo. A psychopathic murderer who would
kill again...
As the Chief Inspector investigates a new case, Ruth Rendell looks
back to the beginning of Wexford's career as a detective, even to his
courtship of the woman who would become his wife. The villainous Targo
is not the only ghost from Wexford's past who has re-emerged to haunt
him in the here and now...
Ruth Rendell is the Queen of British crime writing. The author of
over 50 novels, she has won many significant crime fiction awards. Her
first novel, From Doon With Death, appeared in 1964, and since
then her reputation and readership have grown steadily with each new
book.
She has received major awards for her work; three Edgars from the
Mystery Writers of America; the Crime Writers' Gold Dagger Award for
1976's best crime novel, A Demon in My View; the Arts Council
National Book Award for Genre Fiction in 1981 for The Lake of
Darkness; the Crime Writer's Gold Dagger Award for 1986's best
crime book for Live Flesh; in 1987 the Crime Writer's Gold
Dagger Award for A Fatal Inversion and in 1991 the same award
for King Solomon's Carpet, both written under the pseudonym
Barbara Vine; the Sunday Times Literary Award in 1990; and in
1991 the Crime Writer's Cartier Diamond Award for outstanding
contribution to the crime fiction genre.
Her books are translated into 21 languages. In 1996 she was awarded
the CBE and in 1997 became a Life Peer.
