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A review by ncrabb
Veiled One by Ruth Rendell
3.0
Gwen Robson is well and truly dead, and she has gone largely unnoticed even by the usually observant Inspector Wexford. He had driven through that garage earlier, but he was concerned about family things. Police have charged his TV-actress daughter, Sheila, in a situation in which she damaged a fence surrounding a nuclear facility as part of a protest in which she participated.
Gwen Robson’s body is there sure enough. She has been garotted, and her nearly severed head and body are nestled between cars.
The young man goes by Clifford. He is the ultimate mama’s boy living as he does as an adult in mom’s house, enduring, even in his adulthood, her punishments. Clifford is the guy who found Gwen’s body, and it becomes abundantly clear to even the most casual reader that he’s not stable at all and not a reliable character.
After a family gathering in which Wexford’s daughter, Sheila, has dropped by, Wexford offers to juggle cars so she can more easily be on her way. Without thinking much about it, he snatches up her keys, fires up her car, and engages the reverse gear. But something feels off about the experience; something feels funny; something about the car just doesn’t feel right somehow. Acting on instinct, Wexford manages to fling himself out of the vehicle seconds before it blows up and destroys half his house and the entirety of Sheila’s car. Wexford lives, but it is his assistant, Mike Burden, who must do most of the detective work on the Gwen Robson case. As Wexford slowly recovers, he is intent on finding the terrorists who destroyed his daughter’s car. Who would do such a thing?
This is classic Rendell with its multi-layered information that the author gradually peels back for you. You won’t see the end coming by any means, and you’ll marvel at Rendell’s ability to observe the world and interpret it to you with such literary skill.
Gwen Robson’s body is there sure enough. She has been garotted, and her nearly severed head and body are nestled between cars.
The young man goes by Clifford. He is the ultimate mama’s boy living as he does as an adult in mom’s house, enduring, even in his adulthood, her punishments. Clifford is the guy who found Gwen’s body, and it becomes abundantly clear to even the most casual reader that he’s not stable at all and not a reliable character.
After a family gathering in which Wexford’s daughter, Sheila, has dropped by, Wexford offers to juggle cars so she can more easily be on her way. Without thinking much about it, he snatches up her keys, fires up her car, and engages the reverse gear. But something feels off about the experience; something feels funny; something about the car just doesn’t feel right somehow. Acting on instinct, Wexford manages to fling himself out of the vehicle seconds before it blows up and destroys half his house and the entirety of Sheila’s car. Wexford lives, but it is his assistant, Mike Burden, who must do most of the detective work on the Gwen Robson case. As Wexford slowly recovers, he is intent on finding the terrorists who destroyed his daughter’s car. Who would do such a thing?
This is classic Rendell with its multi-layered information that the author gradually peels back for you. You won’t see the end coming by any means, and you’ll marvel at Rendell’s ability to observe the world and interpret it to you with such literary skill.