Portobello: A Novel / by Ruth Rendell

Ruth Rendell could be considered a modern day Agatha Christie. She's that good. Her numerous mystery and crime fiction books, published since the mid-sixties, tally over 60 total novels to go along with several short story collections and novellas. The staggering amount of praise she's received has as much to do with her standalones as with her Inspector Wexford series which has been a TV broadcast since the 1980's. One of her career highlights came in 1998 when she received a life peer award and CBE (Commander of the British Empire) following which she became assumed a seat in the House of Lords for Britain's Labour Party. Portobello, one of her most recent standalones, chronicles the intersecting lives of several city dwellers in the Notting Hill section of London.
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50-year-old bachelor Eugene Wren is the sort of person who's lucked into the good life. An art dealer and owner of a shop in the antiques market of London's Portobello Road, Wren's made a series of favorable deals in which some wealthy collectors overpaid for several obscure pieces. Now he lives semi-retired in a posh section of Kensington where he casually monitors his shop's business and spends most of his time with his girlfriend and fiance Ella Cotswold. A doctor of general medicine, Ella's not only well-off financially but ten years his junior and quite a catch. There's a slight problem though: Eugene's an addictive personality type. Never fully free of a dependency, he's gone through life fighting alcohol, cigarettes, prescription drugs and food, essentially trading one addiction for another periodically. Currently he's hooked on a particular brand of sugar-free sweets which he takes great pains to hoard, purchasing the candy at different stores and concealing all traces from his soon-to-be wife who can't stand hidden habits.
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One day Eugene stumbles across an envelope overflowing with cash just lying in the street. In an attempt to partly offset the guilt over his addiction and balance the scales of his conscience a bit, Eugene tries to personally locate envelope's rightful owner, publishing a notice in the paper in hopes of getting his man. Of course multiple persons try and claim the money. One of the phantom claimants, Lance Platt, is a burglar and petty thief who constantly prowls around the neighborhood, lurking amid the upper-class homes seeking to potentially rob any of the less secure ones. This time though, Lance meets with Eugene not to check out his house, but because he actually needs the money: his girlfriend's got a busted jaw after he'd smashed it with his fist and she needs a thousand pounds for surgery. The other notably odd respondent is a peculiar invalid named Joel Rosemund, who may or may not have a mental illness (he hears voices) and who latches on to Ella as his personal physician. It's not long before the situation initialized by Eugene's little discovery spins out of control as the secrets and lies get knotted up into a sinister web of betrayal and intrigue.
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Portobello is a great 'neighborhood' novel and the borough of Notting Hill is as good a place as any to set a story. For anyone who doesn't know about Notting Hill or the Portobello Road Market, Bedknobs and Broomsticks is a good movie to rewatch. Thriving with culture, rich in tradition and full of colorful characers, it more than measures up as a backdrop for Rendell's exquisite prose. And the writing is just that. Smart, fluid, funny--it's everything even a non-mystery fan could want. The characterizations are especially charming. The author's portrayal of her characters is as comprehensive as it is fascinating, the narrative fleshing out each's finer points, their psychological makeup and chronic neurosis, personal convictions and internal inhibitions. The evocative depictions of Eugene, his psyche and motives; of Lance and his ever-deepening well of problems; and Joel, who may seem the most out of touch but has a knack for getting what he wants, are what combine to make Rendell one of the truly special contemporary mystery authors. (MYS RENDELL)