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| Ruth Rendell, A Demon in my View |
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Arthur Johnson lives on the top floor of a London house
otherwise divided into rooms to rent. He is a man of habits, a man
with a taste for order and punctuality and who likes to keep
himself to himself. Never late at work, never missing his laundry
day or skipping his cleaning and dusting duties, he also has a more
sinister passion, that he sometimes feels the need to fulfill in the
cellar of the building. Everything is "under control" for him, until
the day when a homonym, Anthony Johnson, rents the room below his
apartment... Arthur Johnson soon
develops a strong dislike for his neighbor. Sociable, good-looking,
Anthony's main default, in Arthur's eye, is that he never leaves his room on
evenings, the only other room (beside Arthur's) overlooking the
cellar door. Arthur cannot go to the cellar anymore and starts to
resent Anthony... Anthony has no interest to go out, since he is
writing a thesis on psychopaths, which takes whatever time is not
devoted to thoughts of love for Helen, a married woman he left in
Bristol so that she could chose between her husband and himself...
Soon, dramatics events are set in motion for
the people in 142 Trinity Road. As we can expect from Ruth Rendell, she leads
the story masterfully to a very ironical conclusion. Rendell starts
with a quote from Poe (a poem from which the line "a demon in my
view" is taken), and the whole story has echoes of Poe's
William Wilson. Also, I realized that one of her latest book,
The Rottweiler, reads a bit like a weaker, longer version
of A Demon in my View. Too bad that now Rendell feels the
need to plagiarize herself a bit, I am sure she can still come up
with original ideas, she still manages it when she writes as Barbara
Vine...
A Demon in my View is a good
(not outstanding) Rendell's novel...
Rating: 
© Discussing Books, 01/27/2005
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| Further Readings |
As Ruth Rendell:
Rendell, Ruth (1965) To Fear a Painted Devil
Rendell, Ruth (1965) Vanity Dies Hard
Rendell, Ruth (1971)
One
Across, Two Down
Rendell, Ruth (1974)
The
Face of Trespass
Rendell, Ruth (1976)
A
Demon in my View
Rendell, Ruth (1977) A Judgement in Stone
Rendell, Ruth (1979)
Make
Death Love Me
Rendell, Ruth (1980) The Lake of Darkness
Rendell, Ruth (1982)
Master
of the Moor
Rendell, Ruth (1984)
The
Killing Doll
Rendell, Ruth (1984)
The
Tree of Hands
Rendell, Ruth (1986)
Live Flesh
Rendell, Ruth (1987)
Talking to Strange Men
Rendell, Ruth (1989)
The
Bridesmaid
Rendell, Ruth (1990)
Going Wrong
Rendell, Ruth (1993) The Crocodile Bird
Rendell, Ruth (1996) Blood Lines
Rendell, Ruth (1996)
The
Keys to the Street
Rendell, Ruth (1999)
A
Sight for Sore Eyes
Rendell, Ruth (2002) Adam and Eve and Pinch Me
Rendell,
Ruth (2004) The Rottweiler
Rendell,
Ruth (2005) Thirteen Steps Down
Rendell,
Ruth (2006) The Water's Lovely
Wexford mysteries:
Rendell, Ruth (1964)
From
Doon with Death
Rendell, Ruth (1967)
A New
Lease of Death
Rendell, Ruth (1967)
Wolf
to the Slaughter
Rendell, Ruth (1969)
The
Best Man to Die
Rendell, Ruth (1970)
A
Guilty Thing Surprised
Rendell, Ruth (1971)
No
More Dying Then
Rendell, Ruth (1972)
Murder
Being Once Done
Rendell, Ruth (1973)
Some
Lie and Some Die
Rendell, Ruth (1975)
Shake
Hands Forever
Rendell, Ruth (1978) A Sleeping Life
Rendell, Ruth (1981) Death Notes
Rendell, Ruth (1983)
Speaker of Mandarin
Rendell, Ruth (1985)
An
Unkindness of Ravens
Rendell, Ruth (1988)
The
Veiled One
Rendell, Ruth (1992)
Kissing the Gunner's Daughter
Rendell, Ruth (1995)
Simisola
Rendell, Ruth (1997)
Road Rage
Rendell, Ruth (1999) Harm Done
Rendell,
Ruth (2003) The Babes in the Wood
Rendell,
Ruth (2005)
End in Tears
Rendell,
Ruth (2007) Not in the Flesh
As Barbara Vine:
Vine, Barbara (1986) A Dark Adapted Eye
Vine, Barbara (1987)
A Fatal Inversion
Vine, Barbara (1988)
The House of Stairs
Vine, Barbara (1990) Gallowglass
Vine, Barbara (1991)
King Solomon's Carpet
Vine, Barbara (1993) Anna's Book
Vine, Barbara (1994)
No Night is Too Long
Vine, Barbara (1996) The Brimstone Wedding
Vine, Barbara (1998) The Chimney Sweeper's
Boy
Vine, Barbara (2000)
Grasshopper
Vine, Barbara (2002) The Blood Doctor
Vine, Barbara (2005) The Minotaur
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