Skip to content
Responsive image
Vendor
Liepman Literary Agency
Marc Koralnik
Original language
English
Categories

LADY IN THE LAKE

Laura Lippman

The New York Times bestselling author returns with a novel set in 1960s Baltimore.
Baltimore, 1966: A wealthy and beautiful woman in her thirties, Maddie Schwartz, divorces her husband, leaves the suburbs for the city, gets herself a job at a newspaper, and starts asking a lot of questions that no one will answer about a young woman found dead in a fountain. Who is the lady in the lake? Why are so many people terrified of Maddie's interest in her? Whose lives would be destroyed if the truth about the dead woman's identity came to light?

Laura Lippman is a New York Times bestselling novelist who has won more than twenty awards for her fiction—and been nominated for thirty more. Since her debut in 1997, she has published twenty-one novels, a novella, a children's book, and a collection of short stories. Her books have been translated into more than twenty languages. LitHub named her one of the “essential” female crime writers of the last hundred years. She also has written for the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, Vulture, Real Simple, and T magazine. Her novel Every Secret Thing was optioned and produced by Frances McDormand and premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival, starring Diane Lane, Elizabeth Banks, and Dakota Fanning. Laura lives in Baltimore with her husband, David Simon, and their daughter.
Available products
Book

Published 2019-07-01 by William Morrow

Comments

Lady in the Lake is #1 on the List of Hottest Books This Week

S.C. Crime Scene Press

7 Best Books of July Read more...

Tyto Alba

"Elegantly written...Lippman again proves she's a sharp observer of people, with an affinity for shaping complicated people in a refined plot." Read more...

Faber

"With a crime writer's sense of tight plotting, and a weighty sense of the power relationships between its characters, Lady in the Lake is aching, thoughtful, and compulsively readable."

"extraordinary....a cracking good mystery", "Lippman answers all outstanding questions with a totally cool double twist that your reviewer — a veteran reader of mysteries — never saw coming." - Stephen King Read more...

“ a writer at the height of her powers.”

“Lippman is a writing powerhouse. ”

Tericum Kiado

“ a force to be reckoned with in crime fiction."

The Ultimate Summer Books of 2019- Lithub Read more...

"Lippman's ambitious novel...demonstrates that Lippman, a former Baltimore Sun reporter, is both a skilled journalist and a master novelist." Read more...

Laura Lippman and Thomas Perry have something in common. As good as their crime series are, they both show the full range of their talents more completely in their stand-alones, as Lippman demonstrates in this riveting historical thriller set in Baltimore in the 1960s. In A Doll's House fashion, Madeline "Maddie" Schwartz walks away from a seemingly happy marriage to carve a life for herself, landing a clerical job at a Baltimore newspaper and setting the goal of becoming a reporter. It happens, but slowly and not without causing significant injury to the lives of others in her wake. Maddie becomes obsessed with the story of Cleo Sherwood, an African American cocktail waitress whose body is found in the lake of a city park. As she jumps between Cleo's life before her body is discovered and Maddie's attempt to solve the crime (in which her paper has little interest), Lippman does some innovative things with narrative: not only does the ghost of Cleo speak directly to the reader, excoriating the reporter for digging into the past that Cleo wants left undisturbed, but we also hear from a Greek chorus–like assembly of voices, some fictional, some historical (including former Baltimore Oriole Paul Blair and Violet Wilson Whyte, the first black person to be appointed to the city's police force), who add texture to the portrayal of the city's racial politics. In the middle of all that is Maddie, a significantly flawed—especially in her relationship with her black lover, a Baltimore cop—but always compelling figure, an utterly human mix of compassion and self-centered ambition. This is a superb character study, a terrific newspaper novel, and a fascinating look at urban life and racial discrimination in the '60s. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Lippman's critical acclaim and sales figures continue to climb, and this genre-crossing thriller will extend her reach still further.—Bill Ott

"The latest novel from the ever impressive Laura Lippman...revelatory..." Read more...

“Lippman has enriched literature as a whole."

Actes Sud

Saint-Jean

Doma Books

“She's one of the best novelists around, period.”

Meulenhoff

"The story is bigger than the crime, and the crime is bigger than its solution, making Lippman's skill as a mystery novelist work as icing on the cake. The racism, classism, and sexism of 50 years ago wrapped up in a stylish, sexy, suspenseful period drama about a newsroom and the city it covers." Read more...

“ extravagantly gifted ”

9 Books to watch for this July Read more...

"LADY IN THE LAKE confirms Laura Lippman as one of America's most important literary voices" Read more...

One of the Most Cerebral and Compulsively Readable Thrillers of the Season Read more...