New Hampshire's Writers in the Loft Series Presents Laura Lippman

On Tuesday, June 14, The Music Hall's Writers in the Loft series will present the New York Times bestselling author and award-winning crime writer Laura Lippman with her latest novel "Wilde Lake," which explores the frailty of memory and how life and circumstance can create villains where heroes once stood.

"Laura Lippman is one of my favorite writers. I cannot focus on anything else when I am reading one of her books. Her writing makes me wish I lived a sexier and more violent life," said author and actress Mindy Kaling.

The 7 p.m. event includes an author presentation and moderated Q+A, plus book signing and meet-and-greet. It will be held at the Music Hall Loft at 131 Congress Street, in downtown Portsmouth, New Hampshire.
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What happens when we're forced to look closely at the myths and stories that shape our families? In "Wilde Lake," the bestselling author "After I'm Gone," "I'd Know You Anywhere," and "What the Dead Know," challenges our notions of memory, loyalty, responsibility, and justice in an evocative and psychologically complex story about a long-ago death that still haunts a family.

Dawn Heffron, the organizer of The Music Hall Book Club, will be the evening's guest moderator. Said Heffron, "'Wilde Lake' is realistic and chillingly restrained.� In the fashion of 'To Kill a Mockingbird,' it will make you question your sense of tolerance and justice.�I'm looking forward to talking with the author, and I hope many others will join in the discussion -- it's a great book club book!" �

In "Wilde Lake," Luisa "Lu" Brant is the newly elected -- and first female -- state's attorney of Howard County, Maryland, a job in which her widower father famously served. Fiercely intelligent and ambitious, she sees an opportunity to make her name by trying a mentally disturbed drifter accused of beating a woman to death in her home. It's not the kind of case that makes headlines, but peaceful Howard County doesn't see many homicides.
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As Lu prepares for the trial, the case dredges up painful memories, reminding her small but tight-knit family of the night when her brother, AJ, saved his best friend at the cost of another man's life. Only eighteen, AJ was cleared by a grand jury. Now, Lu wonders if the events of 1980 happened as she remembers them. What details might have been withheld from her when she was a child?
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The more she learns about the case, the more questions arise. What does it mean to be a man or woman of one's times? Why do we ask our heroes of the past to conform to the present's standards? Is that fair? Is it right? Propelled into the past, she discovers that the legal system, the bedrock of her entire life, does not have all the answers. Lu realizes that even if she could learn the whole truth, she probably wouldn't want to.
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Lippman was a reporter for twenty years, including twelve years at The (Baltimore) Sun. She began writing novels while working full-time and published seven books about "accidental PI" Tess Monaghan before leaving daily journalism in 2001. Her work has been awarded the Edgar, the Anthony, the Agatha, the Shamus, the Nero Wolfe, Gumshoe and Barry awards. She also has been nominated for other prizes in the crime fiction field, including the Hammett and the Macavity.

She was the first-ever recipient of the Mayor's Prize for Literary Excellence and the first genre writer recognized as Author of the Year by the Maryland Library Association. Lippman grew up in Baltimore and attended city schools through ninth grade. After graduating from Wilde Lake High School in Columbia, Md., Lippman attended Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism. Her other newspaper jobs included the Waco Tribune-Herald and the San Antonio Light. Lippman returned to Baltimore in 1989 and has lived there since.

"Ultimately, 'Wilde Lake' is not so much a crime novel that rises to the level of serious literature as serious literature that rises to the level of great crime fiction... In the case of this novel, the form allows the author to share her outspoken female wisdom on everything from civil rights -- though recent events in Baltimore are only alluded to, they haunt the narrative -- to homosexuality during the poisonous Reagan era to parenthood," writes the Chicago Tribune.

The ticket package for "Writers in the Loft: Laura Lippman" on Tuesday, June 14 at 7 p.m. is $41. In addition to a reserved seat, the package includes a copy of "Wilde Lake," ($26.99, hardcover), a bar beverage, and book signing meet-and-greet. Packages can be purchased through The Music Hall Box Office, located at 28 Chestnut Street, Portsmouth, over the phone at 603-436-2400, or online at www.themusichall.org. Call the box office for specially-priced $36 ticket packages for members of the The Music Hall Book Club and Music Hall members at the Contributor Level ($150) and up.