Ruth Rendell is hailed by her publishers as "The New First Lady of Mystery." The fact is that, publishers' enthusiasm aside, Rendell is worth serious critical attention because she has not only created a series of ingenious and clever plots, but has, above all, explored human nature effectively and with genuine insight.

The appeal of the Rendell novels is diversified and full; she uses such interest-generating devices as social criticism, brief comments upon the detective story, and short but striking glimpses of setting (the base of operations is a town called Kingsmarkham in Sussex) to lend depth and strength to her stories. Other elements of style—foreshadowing, simile, metaphor, dialogue, and irony, for instance—are equally well handled, lifting the works above the level of much detective fiction.

Perhaps her most useful device is her treatment of the characterizations of Chief Detective Inspector Reg Wexford and his aide, Detective Inspector Mike Burden. The friendship between the two men is a workable device for maintaining continuity, and the character of Wexford, himself, is developed in such a way as to provide a sane and solid framework of understanding and compassion for her real center of interest: a varied and compelling examination of friendship and love—and their too frequent companion, selfishness. These explorations of two of the most powerful of human relationships are readily perceivable in [her novels] … From Doon With Death, 1964; The Best Man to Die, 1969; A Guilty Thing Surprised, 1970; No More Dying Then, 1971; Murder Being Once Done, 1972; and Some Lie and Some Die, 1973.

In the Rendell novels, friendship is clearly viewed as an important kind of love, though the author acknowledges the difficulty with which contemporary human beings handle the relationship. Wexford, himself, is developed, in part, through his friendships with Dr. Crocker, the local physician, as well as with his deputy, Mike Burden.

The relationship with Crocker is continuing, but, in the natural course of events, occupies less of Rendell's—and the Inspector's—attention. Although Wexford and the doctor abrade one another, chiefly over the question of Wexford's health, the medico does occasionally prevail, when it suits Wexford's fancy…. Even though in one novel (Murder), the doctor's professional and friendly judgment almost destroys the Inspector by protecting him too completely—Wexford has suffered a minor stroke and Crocker's injunctions to the family to keep his patient away from all work demolish Wexford's sense of himself for a time—the relationship is steady, always based upon understanding and affection, and occasionally useful for casting a nostalgic yearning for bygone days, a fairly frequent Rendell device. (pp. 139-40)

In the Burden relationship also, there is sometimes tension between the two men, as when, both upset by their jobs, they annoy one another…. The fact that Burden is much younger than Wexford allows their relationship a certain elasticity; Wexford is sometimes able to abort Burden's tendency to be over-protective toward his son …, and he often urges Burden to make allowances for both his children…. The steady normality between the two men, their ability to balance affection and tension in a realistic fashion, greatly help to offset the horror of the ultimate rejection, the final non-affection, murder, around which each book is organized. (pp. 140-41)

Familial love is another Rendell interest, and once again, the Wexford and Burden families are used as foils and frames. Burden's children, a boy and a girl, are growing up in the course of the novels, and despite the loss of their mother, they are doing so in a vigorous, scrappy way. For a time, their father's preoccupation over his own loss is an alienating factor …, but the situation is resolved healthfully, even though Burden remains overanxious…. (p. 141)

During the period of Burden's alienation, when he is leaving the children largely to the care of his sister-in-law …, his neglect, based on suffering and loss, is clearly contrasted with the seemingly benign but actually devastating neglect that another child has undergone. Rendell contrasts the Burden family with the Swans; Ivor and Rosalind Swan are so preoccupied with one another that the disappearance, some two years before, of her child by an earlier marriage has hardly made a ripple in their relationship…. In both households, the point is made; a totally selfish preoccupation is damaging, even deadly For the Swans, happiness will be easy to achieve; neither is mature or sensitive enough to suffer, and their emotional handicap, acceptable to themselves, is, to the reader—and to Rendell—a fearful irony. Burden is mature; he is able to come to terms with his grief and return to the task of parenting his children.

This return is thanks not only to Wexford's ultimate understanding and steady friendship …, but also to the lessons Mike Burden learns [in No More Dying Then] from the head of the plot's … third major household, Gemma Lawrence, whose child has been kidnapped. For Gemma, the loss of her child is, as one would expect, almost unbearable …, but when he is returned to her, she is able to save his abductor, a former friend, from loneliness and despair…. Gemma's incredible largess of love and Burden's ultimate balance of love are striking contrasts to the Swans' inability to extend their love to children.

Wexford's daughters are grown, one married and one attending drama school. In The Best Man to Die, his relationship with Sheila, the drama student, is used to offset the essential selfishness which is the operational center of another family. Wexford and Sheila are close and loving; this relationship is symbolized by the fact that although the Inspector is homely and Sheila is beautiful, they resemble one another…. The two are not always in accord …, but the steady affection is there, if not always articulated…. (pp. 141-42)

In contrast, the Fanshawe family is presented. In the course of a complicated investigation, Wexford meets Nora Fanshawe, whom he finds to be cold and unfeeling about her father, recently killed in an auto accident. As the story unfolds, the girl tells the Inspector that her view of her father was formed because of the constant string of mistresses he kept…. The end result is not only a loss of love among the family members but also a sort of crippling of Nora to the point where she, too, settles for a life of "purchased" love, a lesson which, in her view, she's learned only too well from her parents. (p. 142)

In every Rendell novel, sexual love, as well as friendship and familial love, is an important concern. In some, however, it is a central motif and an important motivational force. The lovers are sometimes redemptive forces in one another's lives, and sometimes destructive. In the case of Burden and Gemma Lawrence, the movement is toward redemption.

The most difficult adjustment Burden has to make is the loss of his physical relationship with his wife….

Both sick with loneliness, Gemma Lawrence and Burden turn to one another for love and comfort …, and she teaches him that loving is giving. Their affair not only goes a long way toward healing his sense of loss and filling his physical needs, but also teaches him the lesson Wexford has, for years, been trying to get across—tolerance….

In the instances when sexual love is a destructive force, the genesis of that destruction lies in the selfish nature of the bond, even when the lovers are engaged in affairs outside the accepted norms of society. This evenhandedness, always reenforced by Wexford's refusal to be condemnatory or judgmental, lends balance and grace to the novels. (p. 143)

Wexford himself perceives his dispassion as professional preoccupation.

Wexford knew that look. He had seen it hundreds of times on the faces of people who fancied that they had said too much to him, opened their hearts too wide. Presumably they imagined their confidences led him to regard them with disgust or pity or contempt. If only they knew that to him their revelations were but bricks in the house he was building, rungs on the ladder of discovery, twisting curve-edged pieces in the current puzzle….

The puzzles are fascinating to the reader, it is true, and Rendell's skill in developing them is exciting; but there is more. The careful portrayal of the shrewd but sensitive Inspector is central to the value of the novels, and the examination of his sane, redemptive relationships with the characters close to him provide a vital and workable framework for Rendell's compelling, wise, and insightful explorations of love. (p. 144)