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Wilde Lake  By  cover art

Wilde Lake

By: Laura Lippman
Narrated by: Kathleen McInerney, Nicole Poole
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Publisher's summary

The New York Times best-selling author of the acclaimed standalones After I'm Gone, I'd Know You Anywhere, and What the Dead Know challenges our notions of memory, loyalty, responsibility, and justice in this evocative and psychologically complex story about a long-ago death that still haunts a family.

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.

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 18, 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?

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.

©2016 Laura Lippman (P)2016 HarperCollins Publishers

What listeners say about Wilde Lake

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  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

In a word saccharine and boring

I am or was a big Laura Lippmann fan and so I kept waiting for this book to get better. It never did. Narrators cooed and clucked, plot line dragged along the bottom of the lake and heroine made me dream of sending her to a Nancy Drew book.

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8 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

Sloppy and unnecessarily complicated

I kept hoping I would start enjoying the book, but it never happened. It had way too many characters, most of whom still remained unexplored and untethered even at the end. None of the characters were likable, especially not the protagonist, an uncaring, nasty, win at all costs type. Most of the way through the book I wondered who it was that was actually going to care enough to solve the crime---she showed no interest in doing it. When in the last 20 percent or so of the text she all of a sudden seemed to care about such things, it did not go with her personality.

A number of minor points (such as her inability to remember names) were brought up again and again, in exactly the same language. It seemed as though the author had marked several places where the topic could go, then forgot to clean up her work as she completed the book. The whole thing could have used a good editor.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Really captures early Columbia

I'm part of that first generation of kids who grew up in Columbia, back when it was surrounded by farmland and not just another suburb. The author, as always, has a fine eye for capturing the nuances of local culture and history, but the narrator makes several missteps in how she pronounces place names - and unfortunately those took me right out of the story. A Columbia native would know that Catonsville is pronounced like "Kate" and not "cat" for example. Still, overall a nice nostalgic listen for me.

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2 people found this helpful

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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Very Unique and EXCELLENTLY Written

Did the plot keep you on the edge of your seat? How?

The plot kept me on the edge of my seat because of how it was written. It lulls you into thinking it's just a sort of memoir or, but all the pieces come together to reveal mystery upon mystery...secret upon secret, lies upon lies.

Any additional comments?

As a MD resident, I always love listening to Lippmans books because she includes so many local references. The narrator must not be from the area, though, because many names were mispronounced. Such as Catonsville...(Long A sound)....but it wasn't too distracting.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Borrows liberally from To Kill a Mockingbird

This is an okay story, read well by McInerney and Poole. However, I was shocked at all of the plot, character, and theme "borrowing" Lippman has done from Harper Lee.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

This is why I love Laura Lippman.

Laura Lippman is one of my favorite contemporary authors and this story is a perfect example as to why. My only complaint is that while I prefer stories told in the first person, this story bounces back and forth between first and third person narrative. At first, I thought it was to differentiate between the timelines of Lu as a child and Lu as an adult, but as the book progressed, that didn't hold up. All in all, I still enjoyed the story. I might even say that this is the best one yet.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

please teach this narrator to pronounce MD cities

the book wasn't bad but wasn't great either.

I'm a maryland girl myself and it's disappointing that the author didn't correct the narrator's pronunciation issues.

Arundel Mills is not "erin-dell' it's "a-run-dul"
Catonsville is not cat-tons-ville it's 'kate-uns-ville'

And as smart as Lu is supposed to be in this story, she is completely oblivious to things right in front of her face. the book seemed to drag out hinting to things to come and then BAM last chapter the story rushes to an end and the book is over.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Fantastic book

I have never read one of her books. I loved every minute of it. Fantastic

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Is this Harper Lee's second book ?

If you could sum up Wilde Lake in three words, what would they be?

Formulaic. Long.OK.

What other book might you compare Wilde Lake to and why?

To Kill a Mockingbird. Well there was big brother,precocious little sister, and the neighbor kid in the bushes.And of course they had a widowed lawyer father that knew everything,for a while..( Several more similarities.) And they went forward living.
Scout had way more early grit than Little Lu but I suspect their lives were not all that different over time.

What does Kathleen McInerney and Nicole Poole bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

I don't know.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

No.

Any additional comments?

Enjoyed the narration.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Excellent story

This is an excellent story. I enjoyed the twists and turns. This was my first time using audible and I really liked it and will be using it again

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