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If you love to read, and you particularly like a creepy story in the fall, I have to tell you about "The Monster in the Box."

This was a late effort by my hero, Ruth Rendell ("the female Hitchcock"), and it concerns a possible serial killer. A guy seems to stalk people who have a "good" reason for offing a friend or loved one. Say, you're embroiled in an affair, and you want your spouse out of the picture. Or you're tired of caring for your demanding teenager--her presence is ruining your love life--and you'd just like to be unattached once again. This awful guy will find you and propose a murder--and then nothing can ever be proved.

That's one part of the story. Elsewhere, in the village of Kingsmarkham, a woman may or may not have been the victim of a ritual killing. Maybe she just disappeared. She was once a promising high-school student, so the thought that she might not pursue further studies is distressing to a couple of liberal observers. There is comedy here: The observers want to feel politically correct in all ways, but they can't quite quiet the voice murmuring in the brain.....She was murdered for faux-religious reasons, and now the family isn't talking....

The two main plots intersect in a shocking way; it's Ruth Rendell, and you can't predict what will happen.

When "The Monster in the Box" came out, one critic said that the discussion of political correctness was dated and offensive, but I think the opposite is true. I think Rendell was fearless and so perceptive about human nature. This novel also involves a terrible first date, an ongoing investigation into changes in diet fads over time, and a flashback to the "young-person" days of Dora Wexford (a favorite character for any Rendell reader). I'm so inspired by Rendell's fertile imagination. And the characters! They linger in your thoughts. Four stars.
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