Quotes from Laura Lippman

Esskay rested her head on Tess's knee, gazing into her eyes in the soulful way that meant "Pet me," unless there was food handy, in which case it translated to "Feed me.

Bring wine," she hissed into the phone. "And Matthew's pizza. Those lima beans with feta cheese from Mezze. Sopa-pillas from Golden West. Hurry!

sound silly, but I figured out that being happy made me happier than being unhappy ever did." Tess replayed these words in

etiquette rule that dictated a woman should put on all the jewelry she intends to wear, then remove one piece before leaving the house. Maybe two pieces, in his case.

Everyone cared what others thought, even those who were defiantly different. They cared more than anyone.

he began, over dinner at Cantler's, a much beloved but out-of-the-way restaurant near

This was the second job she had lost in the last eight months, and for the same reasons. Not a people person. Not a self-starter. Showed no initiative. She wanted to argue that minimum-wage jobs such as this shouldn't require initiative. She knew how to live inside an hour, how to weather the slow passing of time. She could endure boredom better than anyone she knew. Wasn't that enough? Apparently not.

Founder Rouse wanted to challenge a lot of ingrained biases in our culture; taste was not among them. He gave people the ticky-tacky houses they wanted. The only real choices were brick or wood siding, a Baltimore or a D.C. prefix for your phone.

Are you using 'he' generically, or because it seems probable that a man did this?" Hunt shrugs, indifferent to pronouns. Men can afford to be.

Because whenever a woman kills her child, every other mother—at least, every one who's honest with herself—has a flash of sympathy. Not empathy. They don't want to have done it, cannot imagine doing it. But they know.

satisfactory husband that he was, he was a man and not one inclined to wax poetic about a day of cupcakes and movies.

You can rewrite life all you want, Sandy thought,. It's still a play where everyone dies in the end.

It was as if his fingers knew things, but they couldn't show him unless they were moving, touching. He had to think it was similar for carpenters and writers, and he knew it was the same for chefs.

Oh, God, he was wearing his Tevas.

How many times is a woman allowed to defend herself? In Polly's experience, not even once.

He brought down Michael Chabon's The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay and Jay Cantor's Krazy Kat, then grabbed an omnibus volume of Dick. "And this is the book that inspired the film we saw tonight." Tess stifled a laugh, but not the surge of affection behind it. Where some might have seen an almost woeful ignorance

Things have happened—so fast. Ten days ago, we didn't even know Rudy was sleeping rough again." "Isn't that a British term?" "It is." Mrs. Drysdale is allowed to speak to this at least. "But Rudy liked it. He said it was more like the way he lived. He wasn't homeless. Our door was always open to him. Always.

It's impossible to imagine her in thrall to anything, anyone. She calls the shots even while pretending not to. Even in motherhood, she has shown this steely control.

She was not a dog person. She was not a cat person, fish person, or horse person. On bad days, she was barely a people person. She ate meat, wore leather, and secretly coveted her mother's old mink.

She was a polite person, and politeness meant making others feel better even if it made you feel like shit.

They were, as a family, constantly on the verge of being dangerously, enviably cute.

Tess's Uncle Donald winced when he entered the Kibbitz Room at Attman's Delicatessen. The pained expression

Still, the food is good." Whenever Tess came to Attman's, she wondered why she wasn't there at least once a week. "Best deli in Baltimore, by my lights.

Being a mother was like being trapped in the first fifteen minutes of a horror film. Everything was fine, lovely. But there was this persistent sense of dread.