Review by New York Times Review
Tess's new case presents a huge challenge for this first-time parent. Years ago, a brilliant, successful and thoroughly unlikable lawyer named Melisandre Harris Dawes left her baby daughter in a parked car and watched her die. After two high-profile trials in which she was acquitted on the grounds of postpartum psychosis, Melisandre abandoned her two older daughters and fled the country. Now she's back, with a documentary filmmaker on the payroll, to reconcile with her daughters and make a movie of the event. Against her better judgment, Tess agrees to do a friend a favor and provide protection for this public pariah. But something tells her it's not going to be an easy job. Lippman knows her stuff and introduces some clever plot twists and turns (not to mention a murder). But her character studies, largely drawn from the way people feel about having children, are exceptional. Melisandre may not be anyone's idea of a model mother, but does that make her a murderer? And who's to say what makes a good parent? After all, Tess's friend and partner, Sandy Sanchez, responded to single parenthood by institutionalizing his profoundly disturbed son. ("The best thing about Mary's death was that Sandy could stop pretending to care about him.") Even Tess, besotted with love for her little hellion, has to acknowledge that having children isn't all it's cracked up to be. "No one tells you that it's, well, kind of boring," she admits. "Being a mom." At least until the next tantrum. THE TWO KEY players in Lou Berney's superb regional mystery, THE LONG AND FARAWAY GONE (Morrow/HarperCollins, paper, $14.99), suffer from separate but equally crushing cases of survivor guilt. Wyatt Rivers is a low-rent Las Vegas P.I. who does background checks on prospective casino hires. But back in the summer of 1986, when he was 15 years old and working at a movie theater in Oklahoma City, he was the only person left alive when three masked gunmen robbed the theater, killing the manager and the other five teenagers on staff. At the end of that long-ago summer, 17-year-old Genevieve Rosales, who "looked like a girl who was looking for trouble," vanished from the Oklahoma State Fair, leaving her 12-year-old sister, Julianna, traumatized for life. Julianna grew up to be a nurse, but she never left Oklahoma City, and she never stopped trying to solve the mystery of her sister's disappearance. Wyatt thought he'd suppressed the memory of his own nightmare, but when a job he can't refuse takes him back home, he finds himself struggling with the question that still gnaws at him: "Why me?" Berney tells both their stories with supreme sensitivity, exploring "the landscape of memory" that keeps shifting beneath our feet, opening up the graves of all those ghosts we thought we'd buried. "SHE PICKS AN invisible bug off her face." On that intriguing note Sandra Block begins her offbeat first novel, LITTLE BLACK LIES (Grand Central, paper, $15), a psychological suspense story smartly narrated by Dr. Zoe Goldman, a young psychiatrist doing her residency at a Buffalo hospital. Watching her mother slip into dementia has awakened Zoe's curiosity about her birth mother, who died in a house fire when Zoe was only 4. That mother fixation also draws her to a new patient, a certifiable psycho who murdered her own mother at the age of 14 and has spent more than 20 years in state mental wards. It's too bad the plot is so schematic, because the hospital scenes play well and Zoe has a quick wit that emerges in wickedly unexpected ways. HIGH, DRY and severely beautiful - that's the terrain Ben Jones sees from the cab of his 28-foot tractor-trailer rig in THE NEVER-OPEN DESERT DINER (Caravel, $25), a wondrously strange first novel by James Anderson. Ben's route is a 100-mile stretch of State Road 117 in a desolate section of Utah's high desert. His customers are isolated cattle ranchers and ornery "desert rats" who depend on him for their bales of barbed wire and cases of chili. The best part of his run is always a stop at Walt Butterfield's pristinely preserved but permanently closed vintage diner in the middle of nowhere. There's a sad story behind that, but there are a lot of sad stories on Ben's route (including his own), and Anderson tells them in a voice that's ... well, high, dry and severely beautiful. Ben's dull life takes a dangerous turn when he happens on the model home for an unbuilt housing development and discovers an attractive woman inside, playing a cello with no strings. There's a sad story behind that too, so let's just say that Anderson is one fine storyteller.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [February 1, 2015]
Review by Booklist Review
*Starred Review* Motherhood plus murder equals one intense, uproarious, and riveting mystery from a classy crime writer of wit and wisdom. Lippman introduced former homicide detective Sandy Sanchez in After I'm Gone (2014). He returns in the employ of Lippman's signature sharp-tongued sleuth, Tess Monaghan, whom readers haven't seen since The Girl in the Green Raincoat (2011). A lot has happened, namely, her bossy three-year-old daughter, Carla Scout. Tess is now a gun-packing momma, delirious from sleep deprivation and the perpetual demands of a willful toddler and not at all well-disposed toward her wealthy and glamorous new client. Melisandre Harris Dawes fled Baltimore a decade ago after killing her two-month-old daughter and being acquitted by reason of criminal insanity. Now she's hired a struggling documentary filmmaker, Harmony Burns, to record her reunion with her two surviving teenage daughters. Lippman makes shrewd use of the interviews Harmony conducts as threats and revelations complicate Melisandre's plan. With an intriguing cast of characters, stinging dialogue, hilarious moments, and a superbly convoluted and suspenseful plot, Lippman has created an incisive and provocative tale about parents good and evil. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Best-selling Lippman's fans will rejoice as the return of wisecracking sleuth Tess Monaghan is heralded by an author tour and major print, broadcast, and online publicity campaigns.--Seaman, Donna Copyright 2014 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In bestseller Lippman's searing 12th installment in her series featuring Baltimore PI Tess Monaghan (last seen in the 2011 novella "The Girl in the Green Raincoat"), Tess, now the mother of a three-year-old girl with longtime boyfriend Crow, reluctantly takes a security job from attorney Tyner Gray, a family friend. Tyner represents Melisandre Harris Dawes, who, 12 years earlier, intentionally left her infant daughter in a hot car to die. Melisandre, a former lawyer, successfully argued that she suffered from postpartum psychosis, and was found not guilty by reason of insanity. She left Baltimore-and her two young daughters-behind, and moved abroad. Now Melisandre is back, with a documentary filmmaker in tow, to reunite with her daughters, 17-year-old Alanna and 15-year-old Ruby, who live with their father, Stephen, his new wife, and their baby. Tess, along with her new partner, ex-cop Sandy Sanchez, must assess Melisandre's security risks. Lippman expertly delves into what it means to be mad-and more importantly, what comes next. Agent: Vicky Bijur, Vicky Bijur Literary Agency. (Feb.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Starred Review. In the 12th title in Lippman's best-selling series featuring Baltimore investigator Tess Monaghan (The Girl in the Green Raincoat), Tess is tasked with investigating a complex and disturbing woman. Melisandre Harris Dawes left her infant daughter unattended in a stifling hot car 12 years ago. After a lengthy murder trial that acquitted her by reason of insanity, Dawes left Maryland for a new life abroad. Now she's back, with a documentary camera in tow to film a hoped-for reunion with her two surviving children. However, not everyone is happy about Melisandre's return, including her ex-husband and teenage daughters. Tess and her partner have been hired to assess Melisandre's personal security. As a mother herself, Tess is skeptical about the woman's innocence and wary of her manipulations. But when another murder occurs and Melisandre is once again a suspect, Tess is drawn into the mystery of what happened so many years ago. VERDICT After writing several excellent stand-alone novels (After I'm Gone), Lippman returns to her popular series sleuth in this compelling mystery about a good mother gone bad. Strongly recommended for the author's fans as well as readers who enjoy stories about female PIs such as Sue Grafton's Kinsey Milhone.-Amy Hoseth, Colorado State Univ. Lib., Fort Collins (c) Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Lippman's latest installment in the Tess Monaghan series weaves an exploration of the joys and frustrations of motherhood with a clever and engaging mystery. In the last Monaghan mystery, The Girl in the Green Raincoat (2011), Tess solved a Rear Window-style crime when her doctor confined her to bed rest at the end of her pregnancy. Fast-forwarding three years, Lippman has brought Tess back, now the mother of toddler Carla Scout as well as a full-time PI. She has taken on a new partner, ex-homicide cop Sandy Sanchez (the protagonist of Lippman's excellent 2014 stand-alone, After I'm Gone), but even with Sandy's help Tess struggles to juggle her tantrum-prone daughter, her relationship with longtime boyfriend Crow and her work. The job in question is complex and juicy: Tess has been hired by the rich and haughty Melisandre Harris Dawes, who killed her infant daughter by leaving her in a sweltering car. Dawes was found not guilty by reason of insanity (specifically, postpartum psychosis), but after her trial, she gave away custody of her older daughters, divorced her husband and fled the country. Now she's returned to Baltimore and wants Tess to look into her security. She's also commissioned a documentary on the insanity defense, giving Lippman plenty of room to share her observations on our passion for reality TV and obsession with the most horrifying crimes. Before long, both Dawes and Tess are receiving notes with creepy stalker overtones, and the case takes a nasty, violent turn. Tess' constant worry about whether she's a good mother dovetails ironically with Dawes' fight to win her daughters back. Lippman dives deep not only into the ways women tend to question their choices and abilities, but also into whether all mothers, and kids, are a little crazy. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
