Audiobook Review: The Keys to the Street by Ruth Rendell

The English homeless wander about engagingly in The Keys to the Street by Ruth Rendell, read by Simon Russell Beale, and reviewed by Star Lawrence.

I guess Ruth Rendell is a pretty famous British mystery writer, but this is only my second “listen” by her. She has a way of sort of rambling, giving great descriptions you can lay out in your head, and tipping in neat little clues as she goes along. I am becoming a fan.
In this one, we follow a nice young woman and dog lover (big with me) named Mary Jago, who is homeless herself because she has left her overbearing boyfriend because, among other things, he was disparaging about her having donated bone marrow to a stranger. She doesn’t take to the streets, though, because for one thing she has a cool job (you’ll see) and for another, she has a long-term housesitting gig, complete with a wonderful little dog named (sounded like) Gooshi.

Gooshi leads to Bean, the dog walker and former amanuensis to an S-M freak (see how Rendell sneaks in interesting little things you’d hardly expect from a staid British writer?). Bean is quite the schemer and is always out and about in the lovingly described squares, parks, and private gardens around Mary’s new abode—and where a murderer lurks, impaling the homeless on the pointy fences that seem to surround every house. Nice/nasty….that’s how Rendell likes it.

Into this mix comes the recipient of the bone marrow Mary donated—a mysterious, pale, frail sort—and an oafish, crack-smoking thug named Hob.

Hey—wait—back up the CD…Hob knows the recipient? How can that be?

The reader, Simon Russell Beale, speaks in funny little bursts that suit the story.

Anyhow, you will have a fine time hanging out in these lush environs and trying to figure out how serial murder works in England. I know I did.

Star Lawrence owns the health humor blog, Health’s Ass, at http://healthsass.blogspot.com/, now available for the Kindle. She can be reached at jkellaw@aol.com.