Vine, Barbara. The minotaur. New York: Shaye Areheart Books, 2005. ISBN 0-307-23760-5.

Summary: An upper-class English family hires a young woman, trained as a nurse, as a sort of caretaker for the thirty-nine-year-old son. The family believes that he is schizophrenic, and his incompetent doctor has prescribed drugs that make him mute and docile, but it quickly becomes apparent to the modern reader that the son is a high-functioning autistic and that the drugs are harming him. However, the rest of the family -- the mother and four adult daughters -- find it convenient in various ways to keep the son incompetent.

Rivalries and power struggles among the daughters gradually emerge. Initially, they seem petty and easily remedied, but the family situation is unstable and the feuding escalates, culminating in the murder of one of the daughters.

Like Vine's other novels, The minotaur is beautifully written, carefully plotted, and full of details and insights into the range of possibilities that human nature provides.