Publishing executive Ed Reynolds finds a disturbing ransom note in the Manhattan apartment he shares with his wife: "Dear sir: I have your dog, Lisa.

Only then do events swirl out of control, leading to the downfall of several innocent characters and the triumph of evil.

An anonymous reviewer in The New York Times wrote: "Evil, the author tells us, is a force against which ordinary people are all but helpless; its psychopathology lies outside their life styles."

She has a good ear for dialogue, and the ability to underline character with only a few words, or the briefest snatch of conversation.

"[1] John Griffith Bowen dramatized the novel for Thames Television in 1978 for their anthology series Armchair Thriller, moving the action from New York to London.