Product Description

Blamed by her parents for the tragic death of a friend, Clodagh has been banished from their home in the countryside to a dingy basement flat in the city. Her life is transformed when she meets the inhabitants on the top floor of 15 Russia Road. An exotic range of young people who explore a London of roofs, eaves and ledges, thrilling in the freedom and danger. Clodagh, haunted still by the accident, finds that running the roofs brings her back to life, but it seems that tragedy and misfortune may not be done with her yet. Barbara Vine's 10th novel, GRASSHOPPER is an enthralling, chilling novel that mirrors Vine's acclaimed London Underground novel KING SOLOMON'S CARPET.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #272047 in Books
• Published on: 2001-05-03
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 544 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Grasshopper is the tale of Clodagh's recovery from the death of her best friend and liberation from the guilt her parents have imposed on her for the pylon-climbing that led to it; it is also the tale of new mistakes, and their disastrous consequences. In the London of the late 80s, Clodagh finds her own level--and it is way above the streets, with a roof-jaunting group of disaffected young people, each with a trauma of their own. For Swedish Liv, it is the nightmare of au-pairing; for Silver, it was abduction as a small boy; for the sinister young thug Jimmy, it was sexual abuse on a massive scale. When they graduate from merely clambering around to trying to do good, and help a couple on the run from the social services with a foster child, that is when the trouble starts... The audiobook adaptation is taut and passionate; Frances Barber's range of voices and characterisations adds immediacy to the strong characterisation and never becomes a mere series of comic impersonations, she retains a sense of this story's urgency even in the chunks of back-story that punctuate the main action. Duration: 5 hours--Roz Kaveney

About the Author
Barbara Vine is Ruth Rendell. Nine novels have been published under this pen-name and all are published in Penguin. Ruth Rendell lives in Maida Vale, London. She was recently ennobled by the Labour Government.