Means Of Evil And Other Stories

Apr 19, 2025 9:30 AM

Author:Ruth Rendell

What connects a kidnapped baby, a woman's body left to rot in a cove in Yugoslavia, a suspicious suicide and the century-old case of a wife who poisons her husband? The answer: British crime fiction's favourite detective, DCI Reg Wexford.

In the first of five cases, Wexford is brought in to deal with a distraught mother whose baby girl has been swapped with an unknown baby boy. When a local priest discovers the missing baby, safe and sound, on the church steps, the hunt for the missing girl is quickly over.

Mother and daughter are happily reunited, but the mystery of the baby boy remains unsolved. Then Wexford discovers Paddy Jasper has returned to Kingsmarkham, a man previously investigated by Wexford for violently abusing a child. Now Wexford fears the next reunion may not be as happy as the last...

Reviews

One of the best novelists writing today

—— P.D. James

The most brilliant mystery novelist of our time

—— Patricia Cornwell

Probably the greatest living crime writer in the world

—— Ian Rankin

[Wexford] has become an old friend who gets better with age

—— Herald

Rendell has quite simply transformed the genre of crime writing. She displays her peerless skill in blending the mundane, commonplace aspects of life with the potent murky impulses of desire and greed, obsession and fear

—— Sunday Times

Through the quality of her writing she's raised the game of the crime novel in this country

—— Peter James

Rendell's mesmerising capacity to shock, chill and disturb is unmatched

—— The Times

Affectingly raw and full of surprises

—— Ophelia Field , Sunday Telegraph

Spikey, bleak stories you won't forget ... poignant stories, all of which stand immediate rereading

—— William Leith , Scotsman

Her stories are suggestively musical examples of rich, Glaswegian gothic

—— Alfred Hickling , Guardian

At last, Galloway's stories are back in print in one collection...savagely accurate, engaging and funny, she is one of our great contemporary writers

—— Independent on Sunday

A testament to the sharp eye and shrewd brain of Janice Galloway, one of Scotland's finest writers

—— The Herald

A writer of passion and virtuosity

—— Scotland on Sunday

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