Customer Reviews

Charm City: A Tess Monaghan Novel (Tess Monaghan Mysteries)

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Having read two of Lippman's mysteries, I'd classify the plots as solid and competent, interesting but not engrossing. The books excel at describing Baltimore (I grew up in Baltimore County.) Lippman's writing about the city is wonderfully vivid and, more than most, chronicles not only the buildings, but the people and I think would bring the city to life even for those who aren't familiar with it. In this respect, I think that Lippman is better than Anne Tyler. I do have one caveat, one would not guess from this book that most of the population of Baltimore is black.

The main problem with the book, unfortunately, is the heroine who is the most implausible private eye I've ever encountered. Miss Marple would eat her for lunch. Tess Monaghan is a very immature, whiny 29-year old, who usually seems about 10 years younger, so diffident that she reminds me of the gooey black mud that coats the bottom of some parts of the Bay and its tributaries: a passive nuisance. She bickers pointlessly with her parents: for example, Tess takes it as a personal affront that her mother likes monochromatic color schemes. This doesn't seem to be the result of losing her only job after the newspaper she worked for folded. She only took that job because one of her friends was a reporter, and when she didn't get a job with the surviving paper, she didn't know what to do. It is hard to fathom why her friends have decided that she should go into detective work, which requires energy, boldness and is potentially dangerous.

Tess strikes me as a generally charmless character; I suppose that's why Lippmen gives her a dog in the second book. I often don't find hard-boiled detectives likeable, but as long as I respect them and the stories are good, I don't need to. (Tess is more like half-baked.) A certain sour pettiness goes with the genre. The detective observes all things great and small with an acerbic carping that presumably is intended to show a superior discerning sensibility or entirely too much familiarity with the world's seamy underbelly, but in Tess it's more like tiresome querulousness.

After doing a respectable job on her first case, Tess strikes out completely on her second, surviving only because a friend who is considerably faster on the uptake comes to her rescue. Somehow, even as Tess goes about her detecting, what she is shown as doing just doesn't mesh with how she is shown as thinking. Lippman throws in the occasional Good Deed to make her heroine seem more admirable, but it seems more like a formulaic plot contrivance than a natural outcome of Tess' personality.

Tess' aunts and uncles, on the other hand are charming and vividly drawn and supply the character interest. So I'd say that if you like books with a strong sense of place, this is a good bet when you're looking for something to read. If character is important to you, or you only like to read this sub-genre is it's really good, I'd look for something else.

Former reporter for a now extinct Baltimore newspaper, Tess Monahan is working as an investigator for a city lawyer, waiting to get her license as a PI. Business tycoon, Wink Wynkowski, is trying to bring pro basketball back to Baltimore, but a full scale expose of his lurid past appears on the front page of the local paper. The editors of the paper, the Baltimore Beacon-Light, had rejected the story, not wanting the sordid details of this man's criminal past to jeopardize their chances of getting a top team for the city, but, somehow the story appeared in the morning edition. Almost immediately, Wink's body is found in his car, apparently having suicided by leaving the motor running. Tess is employed by the paper to find out how the story got into print and extends her search by interviewing Wink's wives, the present and former. A constant irritant to Tess is an abrasive, ambitious reporter on the paper, Rosita Ruiz, a Latina who doesn't hesitate to use chequebook journalism or to invent stories to suit her own agenda. When Rosita also commits suicide after being fired, Tess is convinced that both Wink and Rosita have been murdered and sets out to prove just that. The story is just a little too bitsy for me, but there are some great characters being established who will, presumably, continue into further books.

Laura Lippman never lets me down. She really doesn't. I just finished HP6 and I was a little burned-out (something about reading 651 pages in two days that burns a person out). I needed something to just enjoy and not have to be reading every single word and analyzing what was going to happen next. Laura was just what I needed. Tess was just what I needed.

As 2nd books go, this one was very good. It was a little uneven in that it gets really heavy and intense later but is in odd contrast to the beginning, which isn't so intense. The addition of Esskay and Tess' emerging feelings for the dog are great. More of Crow, which is something that is also great. These are fantastic characters that one can't help but wanting to fall back in with them and enjoy your time among them.

I'm going to read the third book. I feel like I'm on a Laura Lippman kick. Not a bad to place to be, let me tell you.

CHARM CITY picks up a few months after the events of Baltimore Blues: A Tess Monaghan Novel (Tess Monaghan Mysteries). Tess is still living above her Aunt Kitty's bookshop, and the endearing musician/bookseller Crow seems to have worn down some of Tess' reservations about a possible relationship. She's even relented enough to accept a job as an apprentice investigator for the curmudgeonly lawyer/rowing instructor Tyner. But this unusually "normal" period doesn't last long, as the editors of the Beacon-Light hire Tess to investigate a case of a reporter undermining the system, publishing a controversial article that was never meant to run. In no time, the subject of the article turns up dead. An apparent suicide. Tess follows the trail through the ranks of the newspaper, convinced the suicide was, in fact, murder. Several secondary characters get some great fleshing out in this second volume, notably Tess' best friend (and crack reporter) Whitney and the always awesome Crow. I am now completely hooked on this series and thrilled to find there are, count them, seven more to go. Bring on the fun.

CHARM CITY appeals to me even more than the murder mystery that kick-started this series, BALTIMORE BLUES, because it deals with one of my personal favorite issues: journalism ethics in a constantly-changing world. While CHARM CITY is clearly a few years behind us - they're still debating the importance of the internet, for example, while the debate is LONG over out here in the real world - it deals with the issues we all face, the philosophy of a newspaper as objective purveyor of information while also an impassioned watchdog for the people. That's not an easy line to walk.

The only place CHARM CITY fails is in its predictability. Alas, I pegged the whodunit far too early. I also am bothered by some of the gender stereotypes - aside from Tess herself, the women tend to be conniving and heartless, and the men lecherous dogs. Lippman's cynicism shows a little more clearly than in BALTIMORE BLUES, alas.

But even if you haven't the slightest interest in journalism ethics or the philosophy of news reporting, you'll still find CHARM CITY a fascinating whodunit. Tightly written, smart and fast-paced, I strongly recommend Lippman to any mystery fan.

As usual, Laura Lippmann has done a great job of writing the adventures of Ms. Tess Monaghan. This is a nice book to read, it's fun, easy and you'll probably not guess the ending.

Take this to the beach!

I really like Ms. Lippman's writing and am steadily working my way through all the Tess Monaghan novels, finding that I either like or love them all, which is saying something.

Lest you think I just like or love any old thing I read, let me clarify: since I started looking at reviews of books and trying to find writers whose styles I might like because they were highly rated by people or reviewers of other books I had loved, I have found myself far more pleased with what I read. That's how I found Ms. Lippman's work, and boy am I glad I did. Her Tess Monaghan series is absolutely superb, as are most of her standalone novels.

This one, which I think is the second in the Monaghan series, isn't my fave, but it's a decent book. You really ought to read this one after reading the first one; for some reason, I get the strong feeling you won't get Tess very clearly if you don't have some sort of frame of reference for her already.

In this one, she's hired by the paper she used to work for in order to determine who hacked the paper's computer system and got a story printed up when the paper's execs thought they'd managed to kill the story.

Tess does her usual stuff: approaches the task with humor, as much deceit as she needs to get the job done, and a fairly respectable intellect (just in case you forget she's an English major, y'all).

I like so much in this novel: her growing relationship with Esskay, the greyhound; her relationship with Crow (her much younger boyfriend); the other relationships of significance to her (Whitney, Tyner, etc.). I like how her mind works, how she quickly catches some things while others elude her. She's not a super sleuth. She's not one of those protagonists who seems so quickly to solve everything, to make connections that the average human being would never make. She stumbles a bit and doesn't always see what's right in front of her face.

In this book, in fact, that last thing I mentioned is what kept the book from being as good as it could be. Ms. Lippman is usually excellent at revealing snippets so that the reader is guessing right along with Tess, but in this one, I could see the end coming about 100 pages before the end actually came. I knew whodunnit. I saw a lot of the end coming, and that really detracted from my enjoyment of the novel.

Overall, had I not so clearly seen the plot developing to its conclusion long before Ms. Lippman unraveled it for me, I'd have given this 5 stars. As it is, because I love so much of what I read about Tess and her circle, it gets 4 stars.

I'd like to know what you think. Read "Baltimore Blues," and then read this one. Tell me if you can see the difference in how the villain is revealed.

Happy reading!

Former newspaper reporter turned private investigator Tess Monoghan meets her friend Feeney, a reporter for the Beacon-Light, for a drink. She finds him drunk, because his editors pulled his story, an investigative piece into the scandalous background local businessman "Wink" Wynkowski, who is trying to bring professional basketball to Baltimore, just before its scheduled publication. However someone hacks into the newspaper's computer and the story runs anyway. Then Wynkowski winds up dead in his garage with his motor running. Was it suicide?

The Beacon-Light hires Tess to discover who hacked into their computer. As Tess begins to dig, she discovers a dark side to the story and now her life may be in danger.

There are lots of twists and red herrings in this story that delivers enough description about Baltimore to almost be considered a travelogue. A nice mystery.

This is my first Tess Monaghan novel and I feel left out. After having finished this novel I felt I might have enjoyed it more if I read BALTIMORE BLUES first and learn the main character as well as the supporting members.

Tess is a former reporter who is now working as a private investigator. She is hired by a newspaper to find out who hacked into their computers and filed a story that was not meant to be published. It involves the checkered past of Wink Wynkowski, a basketball promoter, who is trying to lure a professional team to move to Baltimore. Shortly after the article is printed, Wink is found dead of an apparent suicide. She does her best in trying to find answers to this death as well to other related ones that occur later on in the novel. She will be surprised to what she discovers.

Tess is also investigating an assault case on her uncle. He leaves her a greyhound that everybody is looking for. The Greyhound storyline was a bit disturbing. We learn about illegal dog racing as well as other activities that would shock just about anybody. I do not wish to spoil it for anyone but it was very troubling.

The author piques ones interest in learning about the problem some of these greyhounds have after leaving the track and later being adopted by a loving family. Ms. Lippmans love for dogs is evident in these pages.

I liked reading about Tess and plan to do so in the future, however, I plan on reading her first novel, BALTIMORE BLUES before going any further. Tess is a no nonsense kind of person who knows how to zing people. My favorite scene involved Tess and a cameraman arguing at a health club. If this is what to look forward to on the following books, well, sign me up.

Laura's done it again! With a mix of great writing, creative plotting and wonderful scene-setting, Laura has come up with a winner. Bravo!