When you read Ruth Rendell (writing as Barbara Vine here), it's like taking a leisurely stroll through a foggy English countryside where you can just make out the silhouette and lights of faraway houses. It's a bracing walk that makes you shiver ... and takes awhile.
THE BRIMSTONE WEDDING starts off with Genevieve meeting Stella, a very prim and proepr (and blazingly intelligent) woman who has moved into the residential home for the elderly to live out her final months as she dies from lung cancer. Geneieve feels a connection with this woman who seems so different from her, a lowly-paid carer who has just started an affair with a TV producer from London. Stella proves to be far more similar to Geneieve than she could've ever thought.
The stories of two sets of lovers--Geneieve and her TV producer, and Stella ne her lover--intertwine and defray as Stella slowly recounts the tale of how she found the love of her life too late and who Gilda Brent was (and why there is no record of her death).
In this story of how far people are willing to go for love (and how far love can go), Vine incorporates stinging social critiques of class, manners, divorce laws, and gender. I can't help but feel as if Jane Austen would've been proud of her contemporary cousin in the mystery genre. Amidst the critique and mystery of Gilda Brent's death, we also have a startling exploration of what love really means.
Rendell/Vine continues to impress me with her lyrical, layered storytelling.
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