Put On By Cunning

a captivating and compelling Wexford mystery from the award-winning Queen of Crime, Ruth Rendell

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Summary

Fans of PD James, Ann Cleeves and Donna Leon will devour this enthralling mystery of deception, doubt and death from multi-million copy and SUNDAY TIMES bestselling author Ruth Rendell ...

'Probably the greatest crime writer in the world' -- Ian Rankin
'[Wexford] has become an old friend who gets better with age' -- Herald
'Pacy and surprising right to the last page' -- ***** Reader review
'You cannot go wrong with a Ruth Rendell' -- ***** Reader review
'Extremely thrilling and entertaining' -- ***** Reader review
'Full of twists and turns' -- ***** Reader review
*****
Sir Manuel Camargue, Kingsmarkham's very own celebrity flautist, dies tragically on a snowy night. His death is met with a ruling of misadventure and appears to be an open-and-shut-case. However Wexford, as the investigating officer, has a few niggling doubts.

Nineteen years later, Camargue's entrancing daughter, Natalie, now a considerable heiress, suddenly reappears in Kingsmarkham. When her fiancé appeals to Wexford for help, believing that Natalie is using a false identity, the case of the Camargues is once more under investigation.

Events soon take a gruesome twist and the pressure is on for Wexford to discover Natalie's true identity and to solve the mystery of the Camargue family, once and for all.

Reviews

One of the best novelists writing today
P.D. James

About the author

Ruth Rendell

Ruth Rendell was an exceptional crime writer, and will be remembered as a legend in her own lifetime. Her groundbreaking debut novel, From Doon With Death, was first published in 1964 and introduced the reader to her enduring and popular detective, Inspector Reginald Wexford, who went on to feature in twenty-four of her subsequent novels.

With worldwide sales of approximately 20 million copies, Rendell was a regular Sunday Times bestseller. Her sixty bestselling novels include police procedurals, some of which have been successfully adapted for TV, stand-alone psychological mysteries, and a third strand of crime novels under the pseudonym Barbara Vine. Very much abreast of her times, the Wexford books in particular often engaged with social or political issues close to her heart.

Rendell won numerous awards, including the Crime Writers’ Association Gold Dagger for 1976’s best crime novel with A Demon in My View, a Gold Dagger award for Live Flesh in 1986, and the Sunday Times Literary Award in 1990. In 2013 she was awarded the Crime Writers’ Association Cartier Diamond Dagger for sustained excellence in crime writing. In 1996 she was awarded the CBE and in 1997 became a Life Peer.

Ruth Rendell died in May 2015. Her final novel, Dark Corners, was published in October 2015.

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