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One Across, Two Down
Two things interest Stanley crossword puzzles, and the substantial sum his wife Vera stands to inherit when his mother-in-law dies. Otherwise, life at 61 Lanchester Road is a living hell. For Mrs. Kinaway lives with them now—and she will stop at nothing to tear their marriage apart. One afternoon, Stanley sets aside his crossword puzzles and changes all their lives forever...
In One Across, Two Down , master crime writer Ruth Rendell describes a man whose strained sanity and stained reputation transform him from a witless loser into a killer afraid of his own shadow. Mischievously plotted, smart, maddeningly entertaining, One Across, Two Down is a dark delight—classic Rendell.
192 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1971
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688 people want to read
About the author
Ruth Rendell
447 books1,615 followersA.K.A. Barbara Vine
Ruth Barbara Rendell, Baroness Rendell of Babergh, CBE, who also wrote under the pseudonym Barbara Vine, was an acclaimed English crime writer, known for her many psychological thrillers and murder mysteries and above all for Inspector Wexford.
Ruth Barbara Rendell, Baroness Rendell of Babergh, CBE, who also wrote under the pseudonym Barbara Vine, was an acclaimed English crime writer, known for her many psychological thrillers and murder mysteries and above all for Inspector Wexford.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 163 reviews
August 6, 2023
This is such a delightful little book that I re-read it as one of my bedtime reads.
One of Rendell's first books and it is fun to read the liner notes which say "Rendell is the most skillful of the up and coming crime writers". Of course, she became one of the grande dames of British mystery writers.
In this compact little book, we find a clever plot which involves a man who doesn't like his wife, hates his mother-in-law who lives with them (the feeling is reciprocated), is basically a ne'er do well, and is obsessed with crossword puzzles. He discovers that his MIL has quite a bit of money set aside which, at her death, will pass to his wife. Hmmmmmm, he starts thinking about ways to get his hands on that money when a twist in the story leads things in a different direction. A quick satisfying read which validates why Rendell went on to be so successful.
One of Rendell's first books and it is fun to read the liner notes which say "Rendell is the most skillful of the up and coming crime writers". Of course, she became one of the grande dames of British mystery writers.
In this compact little book, we find a clever plot which involves a man who doesn't like his wife, hates his mother-in-law who lives with them (the feeling is reciprocated), is basically a ne'er do well, and is obsessed with crossword puzzles. He discovers that his MIL has quite a bit of money set aside which, at her death, will pass to his wife. Hmmmmmm, he starts thinking about ways to get his hands on that money when a twist in the story leads things in a different direction. A quick satisfying read which validates why Rendell went on to be so successful.
September 10, 2011
a Rendell specialty: ironic downward trajectories and the banality of drab lives. as always, she resists easy condescension. fascinating and darkly-hued, but at times the bleakness becomes almost formulaic. the "protagonist" Stanley is an often mordantly amusing creation, by turns sympathetic and repulsive. he is surrounded by women who are almost caricatured gargoyles. there is barely a mystery here, but rather a grim, non-thrilling psychological thriller. this early work by the author clearly illustrates her steady hand at realistic, nuanced characterization; still, one can't help but come away from the experience thinking that Rendell is trying hard to be sympathetic to humans, but in the end, they are nothing more than greedy little bugs - a plague upon the earth.
January 22, 2023
Started slow but overall a good one; the concept of a crossword-solving criminal was interesting. One of Rendell's underrated works perhaps, though not her best.
January 2, 2019
Weird, short, highly entertaining. The story of Stanley, married to Vera, and son-in-law to Maud Kinaway, an overbearing, domineering, highly-opinionated churl of a woman who wants nothing more than to have Vera leave Stanley and go live with her in a cozy little cottage. This is Ms. Rendell over-the-top. There are no snide stares or under-the-breath remarks between Stanley and Maud. It's all out there in black and white as Stanley and Maud snipe at each other, back and forth, day after day.
But when Stanley learns how much money Maud has socked away, and supposedly will leave to Vera only if she divorces him, things ramp up quickly. How can Stan have Maud's money - and he'll need it soon as he's involved in a shady, get-rich scam in which he owes his partner some big bucks - and get rid of Maud at the same time? (And of course, get away with it!)
This story is a psychological one, as all Ms. Rendell's stories are, but the tensions between people are all out in the open rather than being revealed a little at a time. There's also an interesting sideline in that Stan is actually a master at solving - and making - crossword puzzles. This gives him an extra dimension not often seen in a story like this. And I did actually felt sorry for Stan, then got mad at him, and at the end, well...
As for the mother-in-law? There are few characters in Rendell's books - and I've read a lot of them - who are even half as despicable as Maud Kinaway. But here's a giveaway - and a personal one at that. My mother had a lot of friends. A LOT. More than anyone I knew as a child and an adult. And among them were some 'beauts' as my family would have put it, including a few who could have beat Maud at her own game. Women like her really do exist.
At any rate, a great, quick read which will keep the reader guessing til the end.
Four stars
But when Stanley learns how much money Maud has socked away, and supposedly will leave to Vera only if she divorces him, things ramp up quickly. How can Stan have Maud's money - and he'll need it soon as he's involved in a shady, get-rich scam in which he owes his partner some big bucks - and get rid of Maud at the same time? (And of course, get away with it!)
This story is a psychological one, as all Ms. Rendell's stories are, but the tensions between people are all out in the open rather than being revealed a little at a time. There's also an interesting sideline in that Stan is actually a master at solving - and making - crossword puzzles. This gives him an extra dimension not often seen in a story like this. And I did actually felt sorry for Stan, then got mad at him, and at the end, well...
As for the mother-in-law? There are few characters in Rendell's books - and I've read a lot of them - who are even half as despicable as Maud Kinaway. But here's a giveaway - and a personal one at that. My mother had a lot of friends. A LOT. More than anyone I knew as a child and an adult. And among them were some 'beauts' as my family would have put it, including a few who could have beat Maud at her own game. Women like her really do exist.
At any rate, a great, quick read which will keep the reader guessing til the end.
Four stars
June 13, 2019
As she does so often, Rendell offers up a slim, strange dive into unhappiness and murder. What this reminds me of more than anything else is Patricia Highsmith's The Blunderer, where an inept almost-criminal botches the cover of the man he's imitating; it feels like Rendell folded that plot up accordion-style and came up with One Across, Two Down.
The novel enters on an unhappily married couple, Stanley and Vera, who have lived for years in the same slightly soiled and out-of-date house; for the last few years, Vera's slightly shrewish mother, Maud, has lived with them. Maud and Stanley despise each other and have never bothered to hide it. Poor Vera is trapped between them, and just trapped in general, slogging back and forth between overwork at home and being on her feet all day at a dry-cleaner's. Once, she was a bright, vivacious girl, but she understandably chafed at Maud's control of her and rebelled by dating the working-class ex-con Stanley. She might not have married him, but pregnancy made it impossible to avoid. It's been a long time since they loved each other, but they just keep existing in this gray, hopeless, largely pleasure-free life.
Vera at least has a sense of loyalty to her family. She wants to love her husband and her mother, even if she's not sure she believes that they love her. Maud, who has a small fortune socked away in her savings, keeps trying to use it to tempt Vera into leaving her husband--then, she says, the two of them can go away together and have a better house and a life of relative ease. Vera resists the offer, but she may be weakening.
And that's what Stanley can't afford. His main occupation--aside from completing crosswords and, later, designing them--is daydreaming about how great it's going to be to have that money when Maud finally dies. Maud, with equal parts paranoia and realism, believes that Stanley might just kill her for that inheritance, so she tells her daughter and son-in-law that she's set things up so that if she dies of anything but a stroke (her most likely natural death at this point, since she's already had one), everything will go to her friend Ethel instead. Stanley is haunted by the idea that Maud might die by accident or might persuade Vera to go away with her. He starts replacing her medication with sugar pills, hoping that without it, she'll quickly decline, have another stroke, and die.
She doesn't. But, in a bizarre twist of fate, another elderly woman does--right there in Stanley's living room, with no one else around. Stanley impulsively decides to switch mothers-in-law. The doctors currently in practice and verifying deaths haven't met Maud and wouldn't recognize her, so they'll take Stanley's word for her identity. Then there's just the question of what to do with the actual, living Maud, currently slumbering away upstairs...
It could be a comedy of errors, and there is a very dark, very bleak humor to it. But mostly this is a novel of irony and desperation, where characters seal their fates by trying too hard to avoid them and where the only way out--the only way to happiness and a better life--is to admit you've made a mistake and try to start over. Stanley needs to do his crossword puzzles flawlessly and in one go, and he prides himself on clever and slippery arrangements of clues, but, Rendell gradually shows, he's both too clever and too emotionally limited for his own good. Bad decision by bad decision, he boxes himself in, and the tension steadily builds--both the plot tension of what will happen to him and the greater (for me) emotional tension of whether or not Vera will wind up paying for his choices as well. This is a dark novel with characters that can be hard to like, and it won't be for everyone, but it's flawlessly executed and haunting, and it certainly worked for me.
The novel enters on an unhappily married couple, Stanley and Vera, who have lived for years in the same slightly soiled and out-of-date house; for the last few years, Vera's slightly shrewish mother, Maud, has lived with them. Maud and Stanley despise each other and have never bothered to hide it. Poor Vera is trapped between them, and just trapped in general, slogging back and forth between overwork at home and being on her feet all day at a dry-cleaner's. Once, she was a bright, vivacious girl, but she understandably chafed at Maud's control of her and rebelled by dating the working-class ex-con Stanley. She might not have married him, but pregnancy made it impossible to avoid. It's been a long time since they loved each other, but they just keep existing in this gray, hopeless, largely pleasure-free life.
Vera at least has a sense of loyalty to her family. She wants to love her husband and her mother, even if she's not sure she believes that they love her. Maud, who has a small fortune socked away in her savings, keeps trying to use it to tempt Vera into leaving her husband--then, she says, the two of them can go away together and have a better house and a life of relative ease. Vera resists the offer, but she may be weakening.
And that's what Stanley can't afford. His main occupation--aside from completing crosswords and, later, designing them--is daydreaming about how great it's going to be to have that money when Maud finally dies. Maud, with equal parts paranoia and realism, believes that Stanley might just kill her for that inheritance, so she tells her daughter and son-in-law that she's set things up so that if she dies of anything but a stroke (her most likely natural death at this point, since she's already had one), everything will go to her friend Ethel instead. Stanley is haunted by the idea that Maud might die by accident or might persuade Vera to go away with her. He starts replacing her medication with sugar pills, hoping that without it, she'll quickly decline, have another stroke, and die.
She doesn't. But, in a bizarre twist of fate, another elderly woman does--right there in Stanley's living room, with no one else around. Stanley impulsively decides to switch mothers-in-law. The doctors currently in practice and verifying deaths haven't met Maud and wouldn't recognize her, so they'll take Stanley's word for her identity. Then there's just the question of what to do with the actual, living Maud, currently slumbering away upstairs...
It could be a comedy of errors, and there is a very dark, very bleak humor to it. But mostly this is a novel of irony and desperation, where characters seal their fates by trying too hard to avoid them and where the only way out--the only way to happiness and a better life--is to admit you've made a mistake and try to start over. Stanley needs to do his crossword puzzles flawlessly and in one go, and he prides himself on clever and slippery arrangements of clues, but, Rendell gradually shows, he's both too clever and too emotionally limited for his own good. Bad decision by bad decision, he boxes himself in, and the tension steadily builds--both the plot tension of what will happen to him and the greater (for me) emotional tension of whether or not Vera will wind up paying for his choices as well. This is a dark novel with characters that can be hard to like, and it won't be for everyone, but it's flawlessly executed and haunting, and it certainly worked for me.
November 8, 2015
My favorite Rendell read thus far, no small accomplishment, because I like her other books, but this one just hit a new note of excellence as far as psychological thrillers go. There once lived a family in an old shabby end of terrace house, a profoundly unhappy family and, as per Tolstoy's sage quote, unhappy in their own way. Quietly struggling on...a pathetic no good husband, a beaten down (worn out not punching bag style) wife and her difficult, overbearing mother. Enter a possibility of inheritance, easy money that would certainly makes lives more bearable at least, a catalyst impossible to ignore by the aforementioned pathetic no good husband, a chance he's been waiting for, counting on for two decades. Alas, much like his wife, he's had somewhat isolated existence, apart from the world, wasting time on meaningless jobs and crossword puzzles and he's got neither the intellect nor the savvy to actually see this through the right way and come out on top. Yet it is precisely his descent, the twitchy glitchy claustrophobic mental meltdown that is so mesmerizing to behold here. Not quite Crime and Punishment, more like Crime and Anxiety and Rendell has done a terrific job of narrating the psychology of it all. Dated as one might expect, but in such a strange way that it reads timelessly old and oppose to set in a particular time and, of course, all the base motivations are timeless as well, money amounts might change, but greed, cowardice, stupidity, cruelty, despair and co. remains. It isn't a whodunit, it's the how and why and what happened dun it and it's a really engaging read. Highly recommended.
August 18, 2016
In this book, Ruth Rendell perfectly captures what it must feel like to do something horrible spontaneously and then spend a huge amount of time and energy covering it up and worrying about being found out. The anxiety is overwhelming and blots out any benefit one might have expected to receive. Super fast and engaging read with a satisfying ending.
September 29, 2019
Dame Agatha and Her Peers
BOOK 20
CAST - 2 stars: An unlikable cast can make for a good read. An unlikable but rather flat cast doesn't do much for me. Vera Manning, her husband Stanley, and Vera's mother, Maud, live in the same house. Stanley pretty much lays around and works crossword puzzles. Maud rules the roost but always comes down on Vera's side. A friend of Maud's (in her very own image), Ethel Carpenter, is coming to visit for a few days. The nosy neighbors are slight, but a tad more interesting. Plus the author throws in a couple of low-life criminals for beating people up. Finally, a lovely and smart Caroline Snow shows up and snoops around.
ATMOSPHERE - 2: Rendell does a nice job of showing us the flip side of England's upper class: the story takes place in a ruin of a house in a not-so-nice neighborhood. "He [Stanley] lay there...miserably contemplating the cracked and pock-marked ceiling which a fly traversed with slow determination..." One can feel the sticky, dirty grime everywhere. But this is a story of greed, and this story could play out at any social level. So the atmosphere, although done nicely, doesn't really mean anything. Stanley waits and waits because...
PLOT/CRIME - 3: ...Maud has money stashed away. A lot. But Maud won't spend anything, not even for her daughter Vera, because Stanley might derive some pleasure. There is a death. Then another death quickly follows. Oddly, neither is really a murder. But "X" just doesn't think things through. I don't know if Rendell is giving us an unreliable witness, or what...
INVESTIGATION - 1: ...because when a doctor shows up, with basically no questions at all, without really studying a body, the doctor hands "X" a death certificate. What doctor does that? There is virtually no investigation until the end of the story. I understand the concept of an unreliable narrator, an unreliable witness. But I could not depend on Rendell and it just felt odd.
RESOLUTION - 1: The story reveals a rather complicated 'surprise' set of relationships but I had to draw family trees a couple of times to figure out one single irritating line. Yep, ONE LINE to explain it all. Sort of. You know the old saying about a writer who doesn't know how to end a book and just has everyone run over by a truck? This is sorta like that.
SUMMARY - 1.8. Given the title and the fact that Stanley lives to work crossword puzzles and then begins to create them himself, I was expecting words or letters or something to be a part of the actual resolution. If that happened, I didn't get it. There are a few tense moments, a few twists, but overall things just don't fall into place. I've certainly read weaker novels, though.
BOOK 20
CAST - 2 stars: An unlikable cast can make for a good read. An unlikable but rather flat cast doesn't do much for me. Vera Manning, her husband Stanley, and Vera's mother, Maud, live in the same house. Stanley pretty much lays around and works crossword puzzles. Maud rules the roost but always comes down on Vera's side. A friend of Maud's (in her very own image), Ethel Carpenter, is coming to visit for a few days. The nosy neighbors are slight, but a tad more interesting. Plus the author throws in a couple of low-life criminals for beating people up. Finally, a lovely and smart Caroline Snow shows up and snoops around.
ATMOSPHERE - 2: Rendell does a nice job of showing us the flip side of England's upper class: the story takes place in a ruin of a house in a not-so-nice neighborhood. "He [Stanley] lay there...miserably contemplating the cracked and pock-marked ceiling which a fly traversed with slow determination..." One can feel the sticky, dirty grime everywhere. But this is a story of greed, and this story could play out at any social level. So the atmosphere, although done nicely, doesn't really mean anything. Stanley waits and waits because...
PLOT/CRIME - 3: ...Maud has money stashed away. A lot. But Maud won't spend anything, not even for her daughter Vera, because Stanley might derive some pleasure. There is a death. Then another death quickly follows. Oddly, neither is really a murder. But "X" just doesn't think things through. I don't know if Rendell is giving us an unreliable witness, or what...
INVESTIGATION - 1: ...because when a doctor shows up, with basically no questions at all, without really studying a body, the doctor hands "X" a death certificate. What doctor does that? There is virtually no investigation until the end of the story. I understand the concept of an unreliable narrator, an unreliable witness. But I could not depend on Rendell and it just felt odd.
RESOLUTION - 1: The story reveals a rather complicated 'surprise' set of relationships but I had to draw family trees a couple of times to figure out one single irritating line. Yep, ONE LINE to explain it all. Sort of. You know the old saying about a writer who doesn't know how to end a book and just has everyone run over by a truck? This is sorta like that.
SUMMARY - 1.8. Given the title and the fact that Stanley lives to work crossword puzzles and then begins to create them himself, I was expecting words or letters or something to be a part of the actual resolution. If that happened, I didn't get it. There are a few tense moments, a few twists, but overall things just don't fall into place. I've certainly read weaker novels, though.
August 19, 2018
The title of this novel suggests a crossword-oriented plot. In fact, this aspect is a rather curious distraction – which I’ll come to in a moment.
In a nutshell, protagonist and professional layabout Stanley wants to get his paws on his wife’s inheritance. His ailing but tenacious mother-in-law stands in the way. When he contrives to accelerate matters, his cackhanded scheme quickly begins to unravel. Relatives and friends ask awkward questions; the authorities show an interest. Meanwhile, Stanley unadvisedly exacerbates his predicament by splashing cash he does not yet possess.
Stanley has a rather unlikely interest in cryptic crosswords. As his troubles deepen, his head becomes filled uncontrollably with the invention of clues. If, like me, you are a fan of cryptic crosswords, this might be where it all goes wrong. Ruth Rendell was a brilliant writer of suspense – but not so hot as a cruciverbalist!
Overall, however, the story kept me reading – albeit written in a basic, at times clumsy style of English that contrasts with others of her works. It is one of her earlier books, published in 1971.
In a nutshell, protagonist and professional layabout Stanley wants to get his paws on his wife’s inheritance. His ailing but tenacious mother-in-law stands in the way. When he contrives to accelerate matters, his cackhanded scheme quickly begins to unravel. Relatives and friends ask awkward questions; the authorities show an interest. Meanwhile, Stanley unadvisedly exacerbates his predicament by splashing cash he does not yet possess.
Stanley has a rather unlikely interest in cryptic crosswords. As his troubles deepen, his head becomes filled uncontrollably with the invention of clues. If, like me, you are a fan of cryptic crosswords, this might be where it all goes wrong. Ruth Rendell was a brilliant writer of suspense – but not so hot as a cruciverbalist!
Overall, however, the story kept me reading – albeit written in a basic, at times clumsy style of English that contrasts with others of her works. It is one of her earlier books, published in 1971.
Read
March 19, 2011I'm a huge fan of Ruth Rendell's suspense novels (as opposed to her Inspector Wexford mysteries, which I don't read as often) and always enjoy her crisp prose and wit. But this novel, from the 1970s, isn't as good as most, perhaps because none of the main characters are compelling. The main protagonist is Stanley, a no-good husband who wants his mother-in-law dead so he can finally put his hands on her money. These two enemies spar humorously, neither of them attractive to the reader, while Vera, the poor wife, stands by her man. She isn't interesting at all, has let Stanley run things for two decades, and so is frustratingly obtuse--as she of course needs to be for the story to work. But it makes for less enjoyable reading than usual, since there's nothing interesting about her as a character. Most interesting to this reader was the look back at the simple days before internet and email, when bank slips were written out by hand and people wrote letters to each other!
November 30, 2007
Compared to other crime writers, this is a great book. Compared to other Ruth Rendell books it's good, but not great. She does such a wonderful job of creating an interesting story even when there's no mystery involved; we know who did what to whom from the outset.
February 16, 2021
Poignant
May 19, 2011
Layabout Stanley is good for nothing except solving and even composing crossword puzzles; certainly he's not good at holding down a job. He's stuck in a small house in London with his colourless wife Vera and his truly ghastly mother-in-law Maud, praying for the day when Maud will shuffle off this mortal coil and he and Vera -- which, in Stanley's mind, means just he -- can get their hands on Maud's money. On the day that Maud's if anything even ghastlier friend Ethel arrives to stay there starts a chapter of accidents that seems, suitably manipulated by a guileful Stanley, to be set to bring about his fondest wish. And for a while everything goes according to his fetid little plan. But then his house of cards collapses: fate takes a vengeance upon him that's disproportionate to his undoubted crimes.
This is an early Rendell work, and hasn't yet the power and the sure touch her psychological thrillers would soon come to have. On the other hand, it's often very funny, which most of her later novels haven't been; Stanley is such a frightful apology for a human being that his attitudes frequently had me chuckling -- not just because they're reprehensible, which they undoubtedly are, but because they're understandable. There's enough validity in them that I found myself reluctantly beginning to root for him: who wouldn't, after a few years in the company of Maud, become fixated on the anticipated inheritance?
Far from Rendell's best -- it doesn't convey that brooding awareness of imminent malevolence she would become so skilled at conjuring -- but an enjoyable piece.
This is an early Rendell work, and hasn't yet the power and the sure touch her psychological thrillers would soon come to have. On the other hand, it's often very funny, which most of her later novels haven't been; Stanley is such a frightful apology for a human being that his attitudes frequently had me chuckling -- not just because they're reprehensible, which they undoubtedly are, but because they're understandable. There's enough validity in them that I found myself reluctantly beginning to root for him: who wouldn't, after a few years in the company of Maud, become fixated on the anticipated inheritance?
Far from Rendell's best -- it doesn't convey that brooding awareness of imminent malevolence she would become so skilled at conjuring -- but an enjoyable piece.
December 3, 2012
Sometimes it's nice to go to something early by a writer to remind oneself that the two of you did get on and it is only in more recent times that there has been a need to part.
The idea itself is nice: as Stanley descends into his breakdown, the only thing that keeps his tic at bay is crosswords. He is a ghastly creep for whom one nonetheless can't help feeling a little sorry. Rendell's good enough to do that. Read her early stuff, if you like this sort of thing, it is quite worth it.
The idea itself is nice: as Stanley descends into his breakdown, the only thing that keeps his tic at bay is crosswords. He is a ghastly creep for whom one nonetheless can't help feeling a little sorry. Rendell's good enough to do that. Read her early stuff, if you like this sort of thing, it is quite worth it.
February 9, 2022
Stanley is a loser and there is no love lost between him and his mother-in-law, Maud. We almost feel sorry for Stanley who has to put up with her jibes. Her hatred for him is also understandable as he can't hold a job and provide the luxuries her only daughter, Vera deserves. Vera is caught in between and has to endure their constant bickering. But she carries herself with dignity and maintains peace. Then Stanley commits the perfect murder when the opportunity presents itself.
The story holds the attention from the beginning till the end. Stanley's obsession for crossword puzzles increases as he slowly descends to his doom.
This isn't a mystery. Ruth Rendell doesn't waste any words when she tells this straight forward story. There are no unreliable narrators, no multiple POVs, no parallel timelines, no twists which are essential ingredients in the thrillers these days. The setting and characterization is perfect.
I don't know why i have read so few books by Ruth Rendell. They are all short and available on Audible for free. I might be bingeing on her books this year
The story holds the attention from the beginning till the end. Stanley's obsession for crossword puzzles increases as he slowly descends to his doom.
This isn't a mystery. Ruth Rendell doesn't waste any words when she tells this straight forward story. There are no unreliable narrators, no multiple POVs, no parallel timelines, no twists which are essential ingredients in the thrillers these days. The setting and characterization is perfect.
I don't know why i have read so few books by Ruth Rendell. They are all short and available on Audible for free. I might be bingeing on her books this year
July 25, 2017
You could almost feel sorry for Stanley. His mother-in-law lives with him and his wife, Vera, in a small house, and Maud’s only goal in life seems to be to get her daughter to leave her husband. On top of that, she doesn’t lift a finger around the house, despite being in tolerably good health for her age, and she constantly reminds them of how much money she has in the bank, while contributing only meager sums to the household. But look a little closer, and maybe the cantankerous Maud is the more sympathetic character. Widowed, and recovering from a mild stroke, she has barely tolerated for years this son-in-law who can’t hold a job, won’t help around the house, and expects her daughter to keep them afloat financially. Who wouldn’t want their daughter out of such a situation? Her dearest friend Ethel, coming soon for a visit, agrees with her, as their many letters attest. When Ethel turns up early, while Vera is at work and Maud is napping, the out-of-work Stanley is annoyed at first, but when she drops dead of a stroke in his living room minutes later, a plan forms in his mind. It’s almost a comedy, but with the darkest motives in back of it all.
April 30, 2008
I wish we had the option of 2.5 stars here. One Across. Two Down is not Rendell's best. With that said, it's still got that cozy creepiness that I love about her novels. Ne'er-do-well Stanley Manning is sick of his sad sack wife Vee (Vera) and shrill mother-in-law Maude. To make matters worse, Maude's longtime friend Ethel will be coming to stay with them, so Stanely will be subjected to a third nattering voice interrupting his already feeble concentration while he solves crossword puzzles and watches tv. Stanley's in quite a pickle. Should he move out? Or maybe he'll find relief when someone chokes on a scone over tea? Or just maybe he'll need to take matters into his own hands...
Note that this is an oldy--was written in 1971. I had to look that up because the Mannings do not have a fridge and there are several references to 'sniffing meat' to see if it's turned. Yuck. I didn't realize fridges were a luxury there as late as the early 70s.
Note that this is an oldy--was written in 1971. I had to look that up because the Mannings do not have a fridge and there are several references to 'sniffing meat' to see if it's turned. Yuck. I didn't realize fridges were a luxury there as late as the early 70s.
December 21, 2014
I have read dozens of Rendell's books, and this early novel is one of her best. In general, I find I prefer her shorter books. I have no interest in the descriptive writing she drifts into in her later works, i.e., what kind of trees the characters walk past, and this engaging story is tautly written.
Rendell has an uncanny ability to drill down into her characters thoughts. Many writers can do this with a single protagonist, but Rendell seems to be able to do with her entire cast.
As is always the case with Rendell, crime is punished, whether through the justice system or the natural world.
What I like best about her novels is not so much what happens as her interest in why it happens. Yes, there is always a murder in books, but I view her novels as literary fiction, not simply crime-genre tales.
Rendell has an uncanny ability to drill down into her characters thoughts. Many writers can do this with a single protagonist, but Rendell seems to be able to do with her entire cast.
As is always the case with Rendell, crime is punished, whether through the justice system or the natural world.
What I like best about her novels is not so much what happens as her interest in why it happens. Yes, there is always a murder in books, but I view her novels as literary fiction, not simply crime-genre tales.
March 5, 2012
Always love Ruth Rendell!! This was one of her earlier works but the story was engaging and was especially interesting because I love crossword puzzles as does the protagonist in this book! A great read!
September 7, 2008
I found the murderer's mundaneness fascinating. This is not as complex as some of Rendell's other books, but it was hard for me to put down.
February 13, 2024
Reminiscent of Highsmith. I didn’t care for the ending.
January 13, 2024
Stanley , Vera , and Maude ( the mother in law with money and a deep hatred of her son in law) are living a life of quiet desperation in the suburbs of a town. Contained in a run down house ( Stanley’s fault) , with few gadgets to help with the housework ( Stanley’s fault) , Vera exhausted with holding down a full time job and waiting on her mother and husband who doesn’t work but does do crossword puzzles … and it’s all about to get worse.
Rendell is brilliant at creating characters and the opening scenes of family life chez Manning is both superb and unsettling hideous . Stanley is terrible - lazy , entitled , cantankerous, misogynistic and totally inept at making a living . Instead he is waiting for his inheritance ship to sail in and shower him with gold.
Maude , however , has no intention of dying anytime soon - and even the saccharine tablets Stanley has substituted for her blood pressure tablets seem to just make her more energetic …
So far so good but soon this is going to tip into surreal madness as Stanley plots the perfect murder. In fact he is so inept at everything that this becomes a dark farce with two bodies , a con man business partner, much gardening, a loft , and a slow descent into madness.
Brilliant .
Rendell is brilliant at creating characters and the opening scenes of family life chez Manning is both superb and unsettling hideous . Stanley is terrible - lazy , entitled , cantankerous, misogynistic and totally inept at making a living . Instead he is waiting for his inheritance ship to sail in and shower him with gold.
Maude , however , has no intention of dying anytime soon - and even the saccharine tablets Stanley has substituted for her blood pressure tablets seem to just make her more energetic …
So far so good but soon this is going to tip into surreal madness as Stanley plots the perfect murder. In fact he is so inept at everything that this becomes a dark farce with two bodies , a con man business partner, much gardening, a loft , and a slow descent into madness.
Brilliant .
May 16, 2023
As another reviewer put it — irony that spirals downwards, and drab, drab lives. In the vein of Malice Aforethought, with the already-tarnishing golden age brought grimly into the 1970s. Written very well, but nothing much here to charm.
A feckless husband schemes half-heartedly to get his hands on his mother-in-law’s money, but things get a bit out of hand after an unexpected death. Folly on display among the lower classes, much as an earlier age of crime writing preferred to showcase it among the monied and outwardly more refined.
For a while I wondered when the crossword clues (something one associates more with Inspector Morse) were going to make a proper appearance… and then they gradually rose to prominence most appropriately and sometimes with dark wit (and the reminder that I simply don’t have the brain for them!)
Very well read by Nicky Henson, especially his menacing cockney.
A feckless husband schemes half-heartedly to get his hands on his mother-in-law’s money, but things get a bit out of hand after an unexpected death. Folly on display among the lower classes, much as an earlier age of crime writing preferred to showcase it among the monied and outwardly more refined.
For a while I wondered when the crossword clues (something one associates more with Inspector Morse) were going to make a proper appearance… and then they gradually rose to prominence most appropriately and sometimes with dark wit (and the reminder that I simply don’t have the brain for them!)
Very well read by Nicky Henson, especially his menacing cockney.
April 16, 2023
Not one of her best. Curiously unattractive characters with barely a redeeming feature between them; a compulsive crossword compiler with ineffective murderous intent, a miserly mother, a wet blanket of a "heroine" and a fraudulent reconstructor of Chippendale furniture. All meander about this story doing nothing much. One of them dies, another inherits, one feels the long arm of the law and the fourth does not get his just deserts.
May 30, 2018
I really liked this book. Ruth Rendell keeps you wanting to read the next chapter. Even though this book was a bit dated, I thought it was great. Stanley was someone you could feel sorry for and then hate at the same time. Every book that I have read by Ruth Rendell is an adventure and this one was also an adventure. The ups and downs and even though you knew what happened, it was okay, just seeing Stanley squirm.
I am giving this 4 out of 5 stars.
I am giving this 4 out of 5 stars.
December 30, 2023
Each Ruth Rendell I read gets better. She kept the suspense building steadily with each chapter. So many clever details like the obsession with crossword puzzles, the nervous tics, the morbidly hilarious internal monologue, made this thriller almost impossible to put down. I have to give this one 4.5 stars for great entertainment value.
September 28, 2018
Not really much of a mystery, more of a psychological thriller but very gripping.
January 21, 2023
Not her best book
July 27, 2023
What a creepy read by the master mystery writer, Ruth Rendell. Nobody has been able to write a psychological thriller like her!
May 21, 2025
Rendell never fails. A slow burn mystery with loads if twists, dark humour and mind games.
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