REVIEWS FROM ANDI SHECHTER

Andi Shechter has attended mystery conventions for over ten years and has reviewed books for over four years.  In April 2004, her cover article on mystery trends appeared in Library Journal.  She was Fan Guest of Honor for Left Coast Crime 2001. 
Andi may be reached at Andi's Email
or visit Andi's Blog

THE MOST DANGEROUS THING          
LAURA LIPPMAN         
William Morrow & Company   September, 2011

Many review books and advance copies arrive with press releases, interviews of the author, information on tour dates, and quotes from other reviewers, all designed to get the reader excited about the book. The catch is, of course, that reading any of this stuff influences the reader. If the reader is, well, me, while I like to think that nothing would change what I say in a review, I can't be sure. What if the red herring, or the McGuffin, or the reason an author chose a setting or name or place - trivial though it appears - ends up in my review and I mess up.

The thing is, though, that I suspect interviews with Laura Lippman would be great fun and very informative. I find myself truly wanting to know (brace yourself for the dreaded cliché) where she gets her ideas. What brings someone to write a novella where the protagonist is housebound, pregnant and crabby about it? What triggers a book about a man on death row who reaches out to one of his only living victims?

Maybe after I read the review copy, I could go back to the interview and press stuff and check out all that stuff that I dutifully recycled the day it arrived. Oh. Right. Whoops.

Laura Lippman can write characters who you don't especially like, characters who are shallow, self-absorbed, annoying, absolutely dense, self-righteous -- any and all of these things -- and you still manage to care about them. In the amazing I'D KNOW YOU ANYWHERE, Lippman's most caring person, the character with the moral high ground, was an annoying prig. That's not easy to do; what's easy is to write good likable characters. I want authors to do that. It makes it so much easier to read the book. But I've gotten rather accustomed to Lippman's style. I've gotten around to liking Tess Monaghan (mostly) who is her series character, but nothing will ever bring me around to liking Tess's close friend, bosom buddy and co-conspirator, Whitney. But part of who Tess is, and part of why she's likable to me, is her loyalty to her friend Whitney. I think.

THE MOST DANGEROUS THING, in the simplest explanation, is about secrets and the value of secrets. When an act is covered up over years, and the truth comes out only a long time later, it affects people in very different ways. People forget. What is of major importance to one person might be trivial to another, but there is weight to secrets. An event from childhood is the focus of THE MOST DANGEROUS THING. And the lies that grew from that event changed things for everyone involved.

That description sounds a little vague, but to go into detail comes too close to giving away the plot. Lippman simply does not write like anyone else I know, which at times makes it, shall we say, challenging to write a straightforward review. The series is easier, at least if you work from the assumption that lots of readers know the characters and setting. But a book like THE MOST DANGEROUS THING is on its own. While I didn't necessarily like the people, I found their story hypnotic. The suspense was brilliant and I had to know what happened, even if I was pretty sure I didn't want to know.

I've been a fan of Laura Lippman's work since I first read BALTIMORE BLUES. At the time, I wasn't sure I liked her protagonist, but I sure as hell liked her writing. That hasn't changed. This woman has such talent. She doesn't make it easy for the reader, but why should she? It's always worth it.