Photo: Jane Mingay / AP Photo/TT (2005)
Sample of authors
Rendell, Ruth
The British crime writer Ruth Rendell was born in London as Ruth Barbara Graseman. Her mother was of Scandinavian origin and her father a former shipyard worker in Plymouth who was able to train as a technology and mathematics teacher as an adult. Ruth Rendell attended the County High School for Girls in Loughton, Essex. She was a feature writer and deputy editor at a number of local newspapers...
Literary figures
Dudley Smith
Gender: Male
Police officer in Los Angeles in four of James Ellroy’s novels. Dudley Smith was born in Ireland, he is tall and broad shouldered, and goes all in brown, one could say: he has brown hair cut very short, brown eyes and he usually wears a shabby, brown suit. Few police officers in crime fiction have been described as so unsympathetic: he is an egoistic and violent bully and, it turns out, a m...