‘Cities Are Resilient,’ Says Baltimore Crime Novelist Laura Lippman
Count Laura Lippman among those who take issue with President Trump’s recent tweets characterizing Baltimore as a “disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess.” The crime novelist, who lives in Baltimore, says the president’s comments represent a “basic disrespect” for city residents.
“Cities are resilient,” Lippman says. “The fact that we survive or thrive at all in the light of terrible problems isn’t to be criticized; it’s to be celebrated.”
Lippman is the author of the Baltimore-based Tess Monaghan detective series. Her new stand-alone crime novel, Lady in the Lake, was inspired by two real-life Baltimore disappearances in the 1960s. Lippman’s story centers on Maddie Schwartz, who leaves her marriage, gets a job at a Baltimore newspaper, and begins investigating the mysterious death of a young black woman. For Lippman, setting her novel in the past was a deliberate choice, made in the wake of the 2016 election.
“It was a time that was at once extremely frenetic and extremely static,” she says. “It felt as if everyone in my life — myself included — spent their time on almost this hamster wheel of social media, the news network of their choice, social media, the news network of their choice.”
Situating her novel in the '60s allowed Lippman, a former journalist, to escape the news cycle, though many of the subjects she touches on in Lady in the Lake — sexism, racism, homophobia — are still front and center today.