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Thirteen Steps Down

Thirteen Steps Down

A stand-alone novel published by Hutchinson in


I’d call her Shakespearean if Shakespeare had lived alone in a tall narrow London house in the 20th century, peering out at the neighbours, walking area cats and planning a bit of harm.

Heather Mallick 1

A classic Rendellian loner, Mix Cellini is superstitious about the number 13. Living in a decaying house in Notting Hill, Mix is obsessed with 10 Rillington Place, where the notorious Christie committed a series of foul murders. He is also infatuated with a beautiful model who lives nearby - a woman who would not look at him twice.

Mix’s landlady, Gwendolen Chawcer is equally reclusive - living her life through her library of books. Both landlady and lodger inhabit weird worlds of their own. But when reality intrudes into Mix’s life, long pent-up violence explodes.

Notes

Contemporary Reads 2

Footnotes

  1. A salute to Ruth Rendell, Toronto Star 2015. ↩︎

  2. Book links may earn this site a small commission. ↩︎