Lippman is such a skilful writer, her narrative flitting between perspectives to bring 1960s Baltimore, a world of racial tensions and sexual inequality, to vivid life.
But when she finds out that the body of a black woman, Cleo Sherwood, has been discovered in a fountain, and that no one else seems to care, she starts to investigate, using every tool at her disposal to pick away at the dangerous secrets and closed ranks that surround this story. Maddie is “the kind of woman who laughs at men’s jokes even when they’re not funny”. She lacks experience and isn’t taken seriously. She is desperate for a byline – “ambition comes off this one like heat”, says one man – but this is 1966. Maddie thinks otherwise, leaving her husband and son to work on the local Baltimore newspaper. “Maddie Schwartz, pushing 40, has nothing to look forward to,” observes one of the characters in Laura Lippman’s Lady in the Lake. These are people committing dreadful crimes – crimes they are horrified by – but they carry them out nonetheless. McKinty’s brilliance lies in exploring just how far a parent will go to rescue their child. “That’s how The Chain works and goes on for ever.” This is genuinely unputdownable, as Rachel follows “the thread into the heart of the labyrinth”. If Rachel kidnaps another child and pays a ransom, and her victim’s parents then abduct another child, Kylie will be released. Then Kylie’s mum, Rachel, gets a call, and it all starts to become horribly, terrifyingly clear: Kylie’s kidnapping is just the latest in a chain that stretches back years. A policeman is shot dead by the kidnappers a couple of pages later, but it’s quickly clear this is not your typical kidnapping crime.
Adrian McKinty’s explosively brilliant The Chain opens as a 13-year-old girl, Kylie, is kidnapped from a bus stop as she checks the likes on her Instagram feed.
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