Byline: Lee Filas Daily Herald Staff Writer Only the Whos in Whoville - who were forced to endure the Grinch that stole Christmas - could understand what Fox Lake residents suffered through Christmas morning. More than 3,700 homes in Fox Lake...

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Ruth Rendell is as English as Simenon is French. In The Lake of Darkness … she does not make the mistake of attempting to cross the cultural borders. Instead of playing spot-the-murderer as in the traditional detective novel, the excitement and tension of her story derive, as with Patricia Highsmith, probably the most notable exponent of this form of thriller, from spotting the victim and watching as disparate strands come together to make an unexpectedly terrible combustion resulting in death…...

Ruth Rendell is at it again in "The Lake of Darkness."… As in so many of her books, this one concerns middle-class Londoners faced with unusual situations, coping as well as they can…. Many of Miss Rendell's books have an O. Henry ending, with an unexpected twist. But where O. Henry was always light-hearted, Miss Rendell is grim, and "The Lake of Darkness" ends with a combination of irony and horror. Her writing style is muted, purposely so, and that makes th...