Some Sun, Some Burn: Lippman’s Crime Thriller is a Mixed Bag

Laura Lippman’s recently released crime thriller “Sunburn” is at times brilliant and at times unintentionally hilarious. Polly, the novel’s protagonist, ditches her lackluster husband and ends up a bar in a sleepy Delaware town. There, she meets Adam, a PI who has been tailing her, trying to gather intel on her whereabouts. Soon, Adam and Polly begin a torrid love affair, and Adam has to decide whether to stay on the job or come clean to Polly. Polly is not without her secrets either, and in this environment of deceit, someone dies.

Undoubtedly, “Sunburn” presents an enticing story full of intrigue and suspense. The novel’s last 100 pages fly by as the lies unravel and the truth is revealed. Lippman constructs an undeniably interesting closing act, but this achievement is tampered by a clumsily written build up. At least 14 times, the dialogue is physically sickening. Almost all of these exceptionally terrible lines are sexual in nature.

“Pauline was a dirty, dirty girl. She wasn’t cut out to be a mother, a wife. How had he missed it?” writes Lippman. Later, Lippman indicates Adam’s infatuation with Polly by describing his thoughts about her “wonderful swell of flesh below, like a summer peach. He hope his jones for her passes by the end of peach season.” While sexual intrigue are a part and parcel of the detective fiction genre, the absurd nature of these lines disturb the reader’s immersion as he or she is forced to wonder whether he or she is reading a mystery or a comedy.

Lippman also seems to enjoy making vague overgeneralizations that at first seem profound, but upon closer inspection are hollow and almost laughable. “Maybe everybody lies, all the time,” Lippman writes. “Maybe in the end, all money is bad money,” Lippman pens. While these lines may have been intended to succinctly describe the novel’s themes, bolstering their effect, they instead serve to make the reader question whether Lippman really has anything of substance to say at all. As the novel builds, however, Lippman recovers the story as her vision becomes more clear.

These ridiculous lines of dialogue contrast sharply with the serious themes of abuse, disability, and greed that Lippman builds on going into the novel’s second half. “Sunburn” improves not only thematically by the halfway point, but also qualitatively. Lippman describes Polly’s years of pain and loss as “scar tissue, the purplish, rubbery damage done by burns, thick and marbled.”

As the novel builds, Lippman skillfully fleshes out her characters, making the reader question whether or not they trust or sympathize with the protagonists, mirroring the dilemma the characters find themselves in. In true genre fashion, Lippman’s subjects are nuanced and complex, each with noble and ignoble motivations driving them. Lippman tests the reader’s assumptions as she slowly reveals what lies in the heart and soul of her creations. In addition to fleshing out her characters, Lippman dedicates time and care to building her environment. The small Delaware town of Belleville serves as more than just a backdrop to the drama, but is itself an active participant in the novel.

All things considered, “Sunburn” is a book worth reading. A master of the genre, Lippman builds a world of imperfect but likeable characters whose conflicting interests lead to inevitable doom. While watching this tragedy unfold is highly enjoyable, Lippman’s chapters of sexual intrigue and vague aphorisms are laughably bad at best, and offensive at worst. The value of trudging through these terrible lines is contingent upon whether or not one derives pleasure or pain from a trainwreck.

—Staff writer Raj Karan S. Gambhir can be reached at raj.gambhir@thecrimson.com