Customer Reviews

House of Stairs

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is a wonderful novel of psychological suspense written by Ruth Rendell under the pseudonym of Barbara Vine. From the beginning, the reader knows who the murderer is, but the identity of the victim remains in the dark. That murderer is a woman by the name of Christabel Sanger, newly released from prison after fourteen years. Spotted by Elizabeth "Lizzie" Vetch on the streets of London, Lizzie hooks up with Christabel Sanger once again, despite what Christabel once did that got her sent away for so many years. Just who did she kill?

Slowly, the facts begin coming to light. The murder took place in an old, odd house on Notting Hill known as the House of Stairs. There Christabel had been living with Lizzie, as well as with Cossette, Lizzie's recently widowed wealthy cousin and owner of the house. Also living in the house was any number of other quirky characters who would move in and out of the house with relative ease, as Cosette was generous and good-hearted. Little did Cossette know that there could exist such evil within the home she so generously opened to all and sundry.

What slowly unfolds is a tale of monstrous betrayal and cruelty that would cause all those living in the house to disperse and go their own way. Step by step, the author peels back the layers of this mystery to reveal just who was killed, as well as why and how. This is definitely a book to be savored, as the details reveal themselves one by one, painting an elaborate plot that lies at the core of what happened.

This may be Ruth Rendell's best book -- it's certainly Barbara Vine's. Don't get me wrong: she's written some fine books, but this one, along with "Wolf to the Slaughter," are prime examples of what writing's all about. When the story begins, we know a crime was committed and someone went to prison for it, but we don't know what the crime was. Vine keeps dropping hints throughout until everything is revealed, but it's the getting there that makes this novel such a treat. Highly recommended!

I re-read this book recently and was glad I did. It is really one of my favorites by Barbara Vine, along with some of the other early ones like "The Tree of Hands" and "The Killing Doll'. The suspense is built up ever so slowly and Vines' prose is at her most extravagant and seductive. The plot has shades of James' "The Wings of the Dove" which is very cleverly inserted at different points in the telling of the story. The characters include a bisexual writer who forms an attachment to an odd, mysterious woman, whom we find out in the in the beginning of the novel, has killed someone, but who was it and why? The writer's eccentric aunt, and other various characters are also devilish fun. Read it and enjoy.

I enjoyed this novel, which delivers a believably evil woman who comes close to Margaret Atwood's Zenia for topping the really rotten girls list. Rendell does a fine job with the psychological mystery, drifting around freely in time to slowly unravel the truth. This is a novel I will tear apart and study to analyze how the plot was constructed.

Donna Meredith

author of The Glass Madonna and The Color of Lies