Wilde Lake

LoveReading Says

Having achieved a full sweep of most of the crime genre's major awards, Lippman has recently also entered the US bestseller list on a regular basis, but has undeservedly not reached the same level of success in the UK. Her Tess Monaghan series, featuring a feisty if contrary Baltimore journalist, is a long-standing delight, but her stand-alone thrillers are getting better and better and Wilde Lake, a complex tale of family ties, crimes past and present is a delicate puzzle with deep emotional impact and insights.

Youngest scion of a family that has always dominated the city, Lu Brant has just been elected the first female state attorney of the county and prepares to prosecute a mentally ill drifter accused of having beaten a woman to death in her own home. It looks like a straight forward case, but it also dredges up the painful memory of echoes of a case decades past when her own brother was accused of a crime.

Soon the connections rise to the surface, and the delicate balance between professional and private begins to waver. Evocative, moving and unstitching slowly like a spider's web, a rewarding achievement with a strong quota of humanity and emotion.

Reviewed by Maxim Jakubowski
Maxim Jakubowski is a London-based novelist and editor.
More reviews by Maxim Jakubowski

About Wilde Lake

Intriguing premise, stunning reveal, irresistible read. (Val McDermid). Wilde Lake is a standout novel: an intelligent, emotional, satisfying mystery that explores huge themes in small-town microcosm, in the manner of To Kill A Mockingbird, the inspiration on which it reflects. (Alex Marwood Luisa). 'Lu' Brant is the newly elected - and first female - state's attorney of Howard County, Maryland, a job in which her revered father famously served.

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