Piranha to Scurfy and Other Stories
A short story collection published by Hutchinson in 2000
The best of the collection is the title story, more horror than crime story, redolent of M. R. James. Ambrose Ribbon is another obsessive. He lives alone in a house he used to share with his dead mother. He keeps her room exactly as she left it, her pink nightdress folded on the bed. The title of the story refers to Volume VIII of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, a book he associates with her.
Ruth Rendell’s seventh collection of short stories also includes two unpublished novellas.
The second novella, “High Mysterious Union”, explores a strange, erotic universe in a dream-like corner of rural England and illustrates very atmospherically what range Ruth Rendell has as a writer.
Notes
Contains: “Piranha to Scurfy” (a novella), “Computer Seance”, “Fair Exchange”, “The Wink”, “Catamount”, “Walter’s Leg”, “The Professional”, “The Beach Butler”, “The Astronomical Scarf”, “High Mysterious Union” (a novella), and “Myth”.
“The Wink” read by Kathy Staff for BBC Radio 4 in 2002.
Contemporary Reads 2
Karin Fossum - Calling out for You
Arnaldur Indriðason - Jar City
Donna Leon - Friends In High Places
Tracy Chevalier - Girl with a Pearl Earring
Muriel Spark - Aiding and Abetting
Margaret Atwood - The Blind Assassin
Footnotes
The Guardian, 2000. ↩︎
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