Ghoulish and unputownable. I mean I say it all the time, but this one’s really killer. Possessiveness, furniture construction, and a cellar filling with cement and bodies! ( )

Absolutely brilliant

I’ve long loved Ruth Rendell’s books and this is one of the best. Completely intriguing from beginning to end, which is as unexpected as it is satisfying. ( )

When Rendell is on her game, her books are irresistible. And this one is a dandy. She's channeling Poe, and showing Stephen King a thing or two. Separate story lines, each featuring a young person whose upbringing was deplorable---one a talented and extremely handsome young man who came up without love or attention, and has a sociopathic personality; the other a beautiful young woman who heard her mother's murder at age 7, and later suffered at the hands of an inept therapist and an over-protective, increasingly demented stepmother as creepy as any in fantasy literature. Tension builds in each story, as we wait for the lines to intersect (as we know they must). When they do, forget about putting the book down.
January 2020 ( )

Sinister. Like a great William Trevor story but way too long. ( )

Gripping from beginning to end. Loads of words but not a one wasted. Another Rendell exploration of an outsider this time a child unparented from birth who intersects with another who watched her mother be shot at the front door & who becomes enslaved by her stepmother. ( )