I'd Know You Anywhere: A Novel

After reading Laura Lippman's I'D KNOW YOU ANYWHERE, and then reading many of the negative reviews, I think I have to side with those that don't think the novel is good. I've only read Lippman's AND WHEN SHE WAS GOOD, and I enjoyed that book a lot. So I expected better. But the problem with this book is not the writing, but the story Lippman chose to tell.

Eliza Benedict has built a comfortable life with a husband and two kids. That comfort is turned upside down when she hears from Walter Bowman. Bowman kidnapped Eliza when she was fifteen, but, unlike his other victims, he didn't kill her. Now, close to his execution date, Bowman is reaching out to Elizabeth for one last favor, and if she complies, he offers to reveal the truth about what happened many years ago.

I've been reading a lot of books lately where authors combine the present with something that happened in the protagonists' childhood. Lippman pulls off that part perfectly, as she alternates between the present with Eliza trying to deal with Bowman being back in her life, and the past when Eliza was kidnapped and spent several weeks with Bowman on the run.

The problem with the novel is that there just aren't that many twists, and the psychological suspense isn't captivating. This novel lacks the detail about the time Eliza spent with Walter when she was fifteen. As a reader, I kept wanting to know more about that time, to be convinced that she was an abused little girl who had no choice but to obey the evil kidnapper. I just didn't get that. The ultimate goal of Walter in the end is also underwhelming. I wish there had been more of a twist, or more of reveal of what happened that summer. But, there wasn't. I finished the novel wondering if that was really it?

Some will claim this novel forces you to think about capital punishment and other deep issues, but since the author never really took a stand, I didn't really care to either. Overall, not a great novel, but still good writing, and I look forward to more books by this author.

Laura Lippman tackled a very unsettling subject with dignity and tact. She never dissolved into a sensational, tabloid feel nor did she ever get preachy. She wrote with a simple, elegant grace that drew me in as a reader.

The main character, Eliza(beth), was abducted and raped as a child and then released. She has lived her whole life wondering why she was the only one to get away. For the most part, she has been able to live her life separate from the tragedy, but then she receives a letter from her kidnapper and her whole world becomes affected.

Ms. Lippman crafted Eliza as a flawed, but still stalwart character. She has more of an internal will than an external voice and that could sometimes come off as passive. I see it more as a coping mechanism and that's ok. It works for her and she has been able to grow and create a life that she is happy with. Using flashbacks as well as present day narrative, Ms Lippman shows the reader just how it felt for Eliza to be kidnapped while at the same time showing how she can grow past those horrors.

The other characters in the novel are given enough voice to not overpower the main storyline while still adding color to Eliza's life. Her husband was understanding and supportive, but not so over the top as to be unbelievable. Her kidnapper, Walter Bowman, was given enough depth to be understood but was not turned into a sympathetic character, which I appreciated. Ms. Lippman showed multiple sides of his personality as well as filtering them through the impressions of different characters so that the reader could ultimately form their own opinion of this man.

The issue of the death penalty is addressed in this novel, but Ms. Lippman does not try to force any opinions on the reader. She has characters that are both for and against it, but none are presented as better than the other or one reason more valid. Again, she allows the reader to interpret the situation based on their own beliefs.

While I wouldn't call this book a page-turner or true suspense novel, it was a finely crafted character study that held me enthralled. I wanted to know the whole story and I wanted to know what Walter's true motivations were; I was truly invested in the story that was playing out.

Elizabeth Benedict has come far from the summer she was kidnapped by a serial killer. She has married and has two children, the epitome of a suburban housewife. She has left Elizabeth, her former identity before that fateful summer, behind. But her carefully constructed normal life is about to be disrupted when she receives a letter from Walter.

Walter is looking at his upcoming execution and contacts Eliza through a third party after discovering her photo is a magazine. He wants to talk to her before his life is over from his position on Death Row in Virginia.

Eliza has shielded her children from her past and will do whatever she can to protect them. She must decide if communication with Walter is better than them finding out about what happened. It also turns out that Eliza just may have some questions herself about that summer and how she ended up being the only one of the girls that Walter abducted that he did not kill.

This is a story that is full of suspense even if you know that Eliza will survive in the segments that take place in the past. What is most fascinating to me was how Eliza's perspective often ended up guiding the events of her life, even at times when she was passive. The impact of that summer on everyone, her parents and sister, and even her children later on, as well as herself was intriguing. I found this a very fun read despite some of the details of the activities of Walter.

Nobody ever knows what kidnappers will do ... will they kill their hostage to keep from being caught or will they do something else?
Eliza Benedict was a teenager who was abducted by a serial killer when he thinks she has seen him burying one of his victims. This teenager girl was blessed or very, very lucky in that her kidnapper let her live, while others were killed with no mercy. Can any hostage victim keep from reliving the horrible experience of abuse over and over?
What does a hostage do when a letter is received in the mail thirty years later from the kidnapper who is on death row?
I wanted to keep reading to find out what happened. I believe you will too ... once you pick up "I'd Know You Anywhere".
After reading this novel, I know I won’t look at a coffee maker in the hotel the same way now.
I think Laura Lippman is a superb writer ... Her work has the bloom of jasmine with just the right power to perfume an entire room.

Jeannie Walker (Award-Winning Author) "Fighting the Devil" - A True Story of Consuming Passion, Deadly Poison, and Murder

Eliza Benedict did not always go by Eliza. She changed her name after she was fifteen, after her abduction. Eliza is a happily, married wife and mother. She doesn't live in the past. She moved on the...best she could. Still, she can't help wondering why her abductor, after killing an unsolved number of young girls, let her live. But she was fine without any answers. Like I said, she doesn't live in her past. However her past catches up with. Walter Bowman, her abductor, who is about to die for his crimes, sends her a letter after seeing her picture in a magazine article. Now he wants to talk to her and isn't letting up. What does he want? And is Eliza ready to dive back into the shadows of her past. What I liked best about this book: Laura Lippman draws the reader in. She writes elegantly while introducing us to people in such amazing ways. She shows the reader just how it would feel to be kidnapped while at the same time how one can grow past those horrors. The characters, for example, her husband and children are given enough voice to not overpower the main storyline while still adding all the crazy chaos of a wife and mother's life. Lippman also gives the reader an opportunity to consider the varying sides of the death penalty without being showy or preachy. She writes with an expert speed with her dialog and descriptions. And most important, to me anyway, is that the ending was perfect. This book will not let you down. It will draw you in and hold you there, urging you to turn the next page until the very last.

[...]

Laura Lippman has never shied away from a challenge. In "I'd Know You Anywhere," she tackles a horrifying subject--child abduction and murder--but takes great pains to humanize the abductor, Walter Bowman. Walter was a handsome and intelligent young man back in 1985, but he could not have a normal relationship with a woman. Frustrated and angry, he starts kidnapping young girls. One of them is Elizabeth Lerner, fifteen, whom he held for thirty-nine days. Could Elizabeth have escaped earlier and gone for help? Was there any way she might have saved another child whom Walter snatched and allegedly killed?

Over twenty years go by and Eliza, who survived (and shortened her first name), is thirty-eight and a devoted wife and mother living with her family in Bethesda, Maryland. Walter, meanwhile, is in prison awaiting his execution. He contacts Elizabeth through a third party and asks to speak to her. What does he want to say to the one girl he took but did not murder? Will seeing Walter finally help Eliza put the past behind her? "I'd Know You Anywhere" is a gorgeously written exploration of the ways in which people deal with wounds that stem from poor parenting, sibling rivalry, an inability to fit in with one's peers, and the unpredictable tragedies that can befall even the most careful and seemingly blessed individuals.

Our hearts go out to Walter's innocent victims while we ponder whether capital punishment brings justice to the perpetrator or those he has harmed. Going back and forth in time between 1985 and 2008, Lippman immerses us in Elizabeth and Walter's world, both past and present. This is not a feel-good book but rather a sensitive, painful, and moving analysis of the complexity of human emotions. The title notwithstanding, we do not really know or completely understand other people or even ourselves.

The characters are so well delineated that they become familiar to us: Eliza is kind, warm, and thoughtful; her husband, Peter, is solid and supportive; their children, prickly thirteen-year-old Isobel and her younger brother, sweet-natured Albie, know nothing of their mother's past; Eliza's feisty sister, Vonnie, can be a pain, but she is a useful ally in a crisis; and Walter is a cipher who continues to rationalize his actions and may still have a few tricks up his sleeve.

Lippman's prose is never less than elegant and controlled. She is a master storyteller who commands our attention with this strange yet compelling story of a series of unspeakable crimes and their aftermath. The author makes clear that life's mysteries can never be fully penetrated. "Cynics fooled themselves into thinking they had sussed out the worst-case scenarios and were invariably surprised by how life trumped them."

Laura Lippmann is one of those extraordinary writers that rarely disappoints.
She digs deep for her characters, and we come to know them very well. She does
not skimp on her words, and she is able to find a way for her characters to wind
their way into our minds and often our hearts.

Eliza Benedict has a wonderful life. Two very independent children, a husband
with a profession that keeps them well taken care of, and allows Eliza to stay
home. They are just back from England and are settling into a town in Virginia.
Eliza has found summer groups and camps to keep her children busy, and she is
now trying to forget the English terms to become once again ingrained into the
US culture. At least, her children remind her each day of words she seems to
mix. And, then, the teenage years she has been trying to forget come crashing
back into her life. She receives a letter from a man who kept her hostage for
six weeks one summer, a summer she wants to forget.

Walter Bowman, has written a letter to her. He is on death row, convicted for
killing another young woman after he had let her go. He recognized Eliza from a
picture of her and her husband in the paper. He wants to see her, he says and
ends by saying 'Id Know You Anywhere.' What could he want? Eliza does not want
anyone to dredge up her story for her children's sake, but she realizes that
Bowman is a dangerous man and if ignored will only go further. Eliza and her
husband stand firm, but she finally realizes she has no option but to see this
man. And, truthfully, she has always wanted to know why he let her go. He has killed
a young woman, and Eliza suspects he has killed more than one. She thinks
Bowman is a serial killer, the worst kind of human. Can she bear to go deep and
remember those terrible weeks? How will she ever tell her children? As she talks
with Bowman, she finally understands he wants to go further than she is willing.
Can she go back there? ELiza faces the world of the unknown and the places she prefers not
to go. Bowman is a monster, and he deserves to die. Can she dredge up those years,
and if she does, would she ever be able to sleep with the windows open?
Can she get past her fear?

This is a tremendously fascinating and harrowing novel. It brings us to our
baser fears, and we wonder how would we deal? This may be one of Laura
Lippman's best novels. It is based on a real story, but names and situations
have been changed. The mystery belongs to us, could we go there?

Highly Recommended. prisrob 8-01-10

Disclaimer: A free copy of this book was received from the store Vine in exchange for an honest review.

I'd Know You Anywhere by Laura Lippman is a crime drama which explores the effects of an horrific crime on all the players- criminal, victim, victim's families and the criminal's friends.
Eliza Benedict and her husband and two children are newly returned to the United States after living for six years in England, when she receives a letter from the man who kidnapped her and held her prisoner for six weeks when she was fifteen years old. The man, Walter Bowman, claims that he saw a picture of her with her husband at a society function in a magazine. Bowman, who is on Death Row for his murder of another kidnap victim, tells Eliza that he would know her anywhere.
Eliza has tried to put that long ago episode behind her-- she's changed her name, and hasn't told anyone except her husband about what happened, but now Bowman seems intent on bringing it back up again. With the help of an anti-death penalty activist, he succeeds in contacting Eliza in an attempt to persuade her to visit him in prison. Eliza is forced to relive that summer and confront the blame that many people have placed on her-- the parents of the girl who died, her sister who blames her for altering their family's lives, and the prosecuting attorneys who hint that maybe she didn't try hard enough to escape, maybe she was not a victim but was a willing participant in Bowman's crime spree. Bowman tries to entice her to come see him with the promise that if she does, he will tell her things he has never admitted to anyone else. Since there has always been a suspicion that Bowman might have been responsible for other deaths than the one for which he was convicted, this is an invitation that is hard to turn down.
As I got into this book, I found it harder and harder to put down. Eliza as a character is not a very pro-active person. She kind of lets things happen to her and tends to take the path of least resistance. Yet there is a core of strength in her that becomes very apparent at the end of the book. While this is not really a mystery per se, there is a mystery of sorts as the book slowly teases out through the use of flashbacks the story of what, exactly, happened to Eliza after she was kidnapped. Was she actually a victim? Or was she an accomplice? Was Bowman really a killer or did the girl die by accident and did Eliza, by her testimony, cause an innocent man to be sentenced to death?
While there were plenty of times in this book that I was mentally screaming at Eliza not to take the action she was considering, by the end of the book I understood how everything she did was consistent with her personality, and I understood perfectly who was to blame for the murder. Lippman does a masterful job of letting her characters tell the story and ends up with an extremely well written novel that will not easily be forgotten.

In 1973, a bank robber and his accomplice held four people hostage in Stockholm, Sweden, and the bizarre incident inspired Nils Bejerot, a psychiatrist and criminologist, to coin the term "Stockholm syndrome" to describe the phenomena of captives beginning to have positive and even caring feelings toward their captors. It is a rich topic that has been well-mined in film and literature. In her latest novel, Laura Lippman at once explores Stockholm syndrome and turns it on its head.

I'D KNOW YOU ANYWHERE is the story of suburban wife and mother Eliza Benedict. Back from years living abroad with her husband and two children, Eliza is just settling back into life in the States when she receives a letter that threatens to destroy her emotional well-being. The letter is from Walter Bowman, who, when Eliza was just 15 years old, kidnapped her, held her hostage for six weeks and raped her before letting her go. Walter is on death row for the murder of another girl, and though Eliza knows he still has the power to damage and manipulate her, she gets drawn into a correspondence with him.

Contact with Walter causes Eliza to relive the horrible summer she was forced to spend with him driving around and camping outdoors or staying in cheap motels, fearing for her life, missing her family and being emotionally abused. The six weeks are bookended by two murders: the one of the girl Eliza caught Walter trying to bury, and the one she witnessed and was powerless to prevent. Contact with Walter also opens the floodgate of guilt and questions: Why did he bring her along on his run from the police, and, most importantly, why did she live when the other girls died? These questions have plagued her and tormented her over the years and have been the source of pain for the family of Holly, the last girl Walter killed. Holly's mother has long resented Eliza for her life and for the role she imagines Eliza played in her daughter's death.

Now Walter wants to meet with Eliza face to face, and she must confront her traumatic past in order to try to understand it. But, as she moves closer and closer to this meeting, she feels the emotional pull again as she felt it as a 15-year-old victim at the mercy of a deranged killer who held her life in his hands.

I'D KNOW YOU ANYWHERE is an emotional thriller, and while lesser writers would focus on the crimes themselves, Lippman takes the story further and unpacks all the messy and complicated details of not only the actual crimes, but also the resultant years that have left Eliza to think about them and her role in the drama. Accused of being an accomplice and Walter's girlfriend, Eliza admits she had several chances to run away and escape, but she did not. And now she fears not only that her children will find out what happened to her that summer (she changed her name), but also that if she ignores Walter, she will never discover what she meant to him. The relationship between victim and criminal here moves beyond a simple understanding of Stockholm syndrome or any other textbook definition. Lippman's characters are more emotionally nuanced, complex and real than those found in an average crime novel.

The book is taut and fascinating, but that is what readers have to come to expect of Lippman. It also shares with the rest of her work her ability to see a particular crime as an intersection of actual lives with serious social and psychological consequences. Eliza Benedict and her family, and Walter Bowman and his victims (and his creepy advocate and admirer), are interesting and well-written, and thankfully not always easy to relate to or comprehend. I'D KNOW YOU ANYWHERE is a piercing, frightening, absorbing and well-paced read from one of the most intense literary crime writers around.

--- Reviewed by Sarah Rachel Egelman

Eliza Benedict is content in her life as a housewife. Mother to the teenage Iso and the younger Albie, Eliza and her family have just made the move back to the States, having spent quite a few years in England. When an unexpected note from someone in her past is delivered in her daily mail, Eliza's carefully ordered world begins to crumble around her. You see, back when Eliza (then Elizabeth) was only fourteen, she was kidnapped and held captive by a serial killer named Walter Bowman. The only one of Bowman's victims to remain alive, Elizabeth eventually escapes Walter and has gone on to lead a quite normal life. But now Walter wants Elizabeth to visit him in the prison where he is awaiting execution, promising her that if she does, he will reveal all the details that have remained hidden about the other girls he has killed. Eliza wants to visit Walter for her own reasons but doesn't realize that he has a plan to free himself, using Eliza's complicity to do it. As Eliza wends her way through increasing difficulties with her teenage daughter and her moral uncertainty about visiting Walter, other people tied to both Walter and her past begin to find their way into Eliza'a quiet life, freshening the old wounds that Eliza thought she had buried forever. Both intricately plotted and suspenseful, I'd Know You Anywhere is a haunting read that leaves its readers questioning until the last page is turned.

Though I am not usually a big fan of mystery/thrillers, a few moths ago I had the pleasure of reading my first book by Laura Lippman, called Life Sentences. I discovered that Lippman was not only adept making the book a thrill ride but also peppering it with the kinds of literary asides I really enjoy. Since reading that book, I have been wanting to sample some of her other offerings, and when TLC Book Tours approached me about reviewing this book, I snapped it up. I was greatly pleased by the story I found within its pages and am now thinking that I am going to have to go back and read Lippman's backlist.

Reading about the life of Eliza Benedict was very interesting. Though it takes a little while for her backstory to fully develop, I could see from the beginning that Eliza has gotten along by flying under the radar. Quiet and unassuming, Eliza makes it a point to always be polite in any situation. As I read on, I discovered that these were precisely the traits that kept her alive during her forty days with Walter. Eliza wants nothing more than to sink into her shy life with her husband and her children and is very pleased that her escapade with Walter has been forgotten by the world at large. Lippman takes pains to portray Eliza as plain and uncomplicated, which is thought-provoking, considering her past and the things that are threatening to bubble up in her future. She deals with the life of a snotty teenage daughter and an egotistical sister but it is Eliza's unremarkableness that truly sets this story on edge. Because Eliza refuses to engage in the drama of everyday life, and the drama of her past, she becomes the blank slate that the story can begin to sprawl upon.

This story is told through an inventive display of flashback, alternating points of view and sections focused on the present. Some of the chapters are told from the viewpoint of Walter, who is not only conniving and crafty but very misguided. At first, one could almost sympathize with him because he feels that he is special and deserving of the type of attention that he never gets. But soon, Walter begins to act like a predator, forcing young women to submit to him and later killing them. He has ways of justifying these behaviors to himself, and later to Eliza, but it was clear to me that Walter was a very sick individual who was trying to achieve something impossible through the murders of the young women. It's fascinating to me that Lippman chose to portray Walter from several different angles. He was a killer, yes, but there were times that he had a human side and times that he experienced unexpectedly complicated feelings over the things he did. Walter and his actions were never only black and white, but as the story progressed, his grays became darker and darker, turning him into the kind of man that he was sure he could never be.

A portion of this story revolves around the death penalty. Though Lippman stays clear of expressing a personal opinion about it one way or the other, her characters run the gamut as opposed, proactive and unsure of this issue. Is it right for the state to basically commit the same crime that the criminal is convicted of? Is anyone ever really deserving of death? In this book, each side is represented and explained but to some degree, the question is never fully answered. How does one quantify the suffering of a murdered child? Clearly, Lippman has given much thought to this subject and manages to present things in a way that fully encompasses all sides at once while never become tiring or preachy. It's obvious that given the crimes he is accused of that Walter is in serious trouble, but does his abstaining to kill Eliza and the murkiness of the fact surrounding the murders necessarily mean that he should be spared death, or do his misdeeds trump all of that? I found that reading about this conundrum from several different angles made me really stop to analyze the appropriateness of the death penalty, and though I didn't walk away with any concrete answers, the book gave me a lot of food for thought.

When forced to examine the situation from Eliza's perspective, I grew more anxious for her. Managing to put things behind her was very heroic in my opinion, but the doubt that she faced about her complicity in the other girls' murders and the strange feelings she had for Walter made an impression on me. Eliza was forced to look at things that she had managed to forget about and took away some very surprising information and conclusions about Walter and herself. That Eliza was not the victim of murder did not mean that she wasn't a victim, and in a strange way, she had reason to be grateful to Walter while also hating and fearing him. But how far does this gratitude really extend? A complex position to be in, I am sure, and one that Lippman excels at creating. And just what are Eliza's real reasons for wanting to visit Walter? Are they really benign or is there something darker lurking in her intentions?

Though I think I liked Life Sentences just a touch more than this novel, overall I was impressed with the breadth and scope of the messages that Lippman manages to portray. I'm coming to discover that there are many nuances to Lippman's writing and the one I think I enjoy most is the very literary feel that she gives to her thrillers. This is not only a book that tells a story, it's a book that asks bigger questions and gives the reader the freedom to reason them out for themselves. In a world where thrillers are a dime-a-dozen, Lippman's books manage to be unforgettable and morally complex, which is just about the highest compliment I can bestow. If you're looking for something that will get your blood racing but that also manages to be smart and provocative, I would highly recommend this book to you. You really can't go wrong with Lippman's approach to the genre, a fact which I am pleased to recognize and which will lead me to sample more of her work. Recommended!

Eliza Benedict, 38 years old, has by choice always been a full-time wife and mother, devoted to caring for and protecting her family. The serenity of that life is threatened one day when her mail holds a letter from Walter Bowman, the man, now on Death Row, who had kidnapped her and held her hostage for 39 days when she was a child, then called Elizabeth Lerner. No one in her present life knows about her ordeal [forever referred to with the euphemistic phrase "the summer I was fifteen"] other than her parents, her sister, and her husband. Even, or perhaps especially, her children - 13-year-old Isobel [or "Iso," as she prefers to be called, with a long "I"] and eight-year-old Albie - know nothing of that time. Having spotted a photo of her and her husband in The Washingtonian, Walter has tracked her down and sent the letter which, hauntingly, concludes with the words "I'd know you anywhere."

The early chapters alternate pov between Eliza and Walter, to illuminating effect. Walter had two other known victims, young girls both tall and blonde [neither of which describes Elizabeth], both killed and apparently raped. The question had always stayed in her mind: Why had he let her live? And was Walter, as long suspected, also behind the disappearance of several other young girls from the area who had never been found? Twenty-two years after she had been rescued, Walter's attorneys had gone through two appeals and a retrial; 46 years old, he has now been on Death Row in Virginia longer than anyone else in history, and implores Eliza to write and ultimately to visit him, teasing her with the promise that he would finally disclose to her things he had never admitted to anyone else.

Eliza and, by extension, her husband, are forced to relieve that time, when "Elizabeth" had determined she would do whatever was necessary to stay alive, becoming a modern-day Scheherazade, telling him her own version of Steinbeck stories lest he get bored and kill her, obeying him without question when he threatened her life and the lives of her family should she fail to follow his orders. Since his last victim was kidnapped while Elizabeth was with him, she bears the guilt [and the accusations of that girl's family] of perhaps having been able to do something to save her life had she but known how. A full airing is also given to the arguments on all sides of the death penalty: "for, against, or confused."

This latest novel by the author of the wonderful Tess Monaghan series and, more recently, the terrific standalone "What the Dead Know," is also highly recommended.

To be quite honest, this book was a boring, dismal disappointment. A book that could have been (and started out being) a good psychological thriller turned into Women's Fiction far below the quality a book club could enjoy.

An entire book about a victim being harrassed by her kidnapper/rapist from his prison cell would almost be fine, if her reactions and behaviors were normal. A woman so terrified that she's changed her name and slept with closed windows for decades absolutely would not install a phone to take the sicko's calls. She'd call the police and her attorney. Game over. Yet, I was stupid enough to read on, although I skipped more pages than I read after about 200.

I nearly gave up, but was hoping for something shocking in the "big reveal" plot twist...which turned out to be legally implausible, not to mention silly and idiotic. I also wasn't terribly appreciative of the trite 1980's references throughout the book.

For Stephen King to recommend this book only shows what he considers "quality" these days. Keep this in mind when deciding whether to buy his next book!

First Line: "Iso, time for---"

After living in England for six years, 38-year-old married mother of two Eliza Benedict has returned with her family to Bethesda, Maryland. In their affluent neighborhood having lived in England has a great deal of cachet. Her teenage daughter, Isobel, is turning into an angry, snobbish stranger while her young son, Albie, is still a lovable little boy who's eager to please. The last thing Eliza ever expected was a letter from Walter Bowman waiting in the mailbox for her.

Back in 1985 when Eliza was fifteen, she was kidnapped and kept for weeks by Walter Bowman as he made a endless road trip through a tri-state area. She is there when Walter abducts and murders another teenage girl, but fortunately is rescued and returned to her parents and sister shortly thereafter. Naturally this experience has had repercussions on Eliza's life and relationships ever since.

Walter is now on death row and ostensibly wants to make amends before his execution. He uses as go-between an advocate for prisoners, Barbara LaFortuny. Eliza knows he has a different agenda-- as she has her own. Lippman alternates chapters between the present and Eliza's nightmare back in 1985, and what unfolds is a masterful novel about fear, manipulation and survival.

After such a horrendous experience, everyone has had the tendency to close ranks around Eliza to protect her. Who wouldn't? But Eliza learns that one of the consequences of this protection is that she's given up a lot of control over her own life.

I love the way Lippman holds each character up to the light like a prism, and moves that prism a bit at a time, uncovering nuances of behavior and thought that had previously been unseen. It's the major reason why opinions about characters can change the further one progresses into the book. The more one sees the character, the more one thinks, and a more reliable opinion is formed. Lippman even had me wavering over Walter Bowman's character until she'd twisted that prism around a few more times.

If you like reading a novel that worms its way into your mind with brilliant plotting and nuanced characterization, I'd Know You Anywhere is a book for you.

I was a latecomer to Laura Lippman's novelist career, but since discovering her I have read everything she has written, including her short story collections (It doesn't hurt that Baltimore is my hometown). I put her among the heavyweights in crime fiction writing, including the current master, Michael Connelly. She is not a flashy prose stylist who deals in dark subjects (Gillian Flynn owns that turf), but a careful chronicler of ordinary people caught in dangerous situations. I think she creates the best female characters in the genre. Like Ross MacDonald, she is intrigued by crimes committed long ago that come back decades later to haunt someone. Faulty memory has been a favorite theme of hers recently.

As reflected in some of the reviews here, those going into "I'd Know You Anywhere" who expect her to deliver another rock-your-world surprise ending like she delivered in "What the Dead Know" may end up disappointed. The reason is that this is not a shocker, but a psychological suspenser. The key question -- does 38-year-old Eliza Benedict mis-remember what happened at age 15 while she spent weeks on the road with a deranged kidnapper/rapist/killer who is now on death row in Virginia weeks away from his lethal injection -- is the driving issue throughout the novel. If her memory is faulty, and he can convince her in a face-to-face meeting, it could make him eligible for life in prison instead of death. He's got something to hang over her -- nobody (her husband and sister excepted) in her current life knows her past. He could out her to the world. She doesn't want that. Her kids don't even know this part of her past. She agrees to a meeting in the prison, which is the climax of the novel. And Laura does pull off kind of a surprise.

I liked it that Laura now feels free to set aside her Baltimore mania -- the novel is set in the D.C. suburbs in Maryland and Virginia -- that actually burdened novels like "In a Strange City." Baltimore is cool, Laura. Everyone knows this now. Time to move on. You have readers now that don't care that the Brass Elephant is your favorite bar hangout. It's out of business now anyway.

The likelihood is strong that Baltimore mania will return when she delivers her next Tess novel (though not necessarily -- Tess has had adventures elsewhere). That's fine with me. I grew up with Berger cookies and Esskay franks. But Laura, where do you go for snoballs? Plus, Tess really needs a doctor who can correct her allergy to shellfish. In Crabtown, USA, that's just perverse. Sorry, but if you live in Baltimore and love Laura Lippman novels, you have a certain ownership.

Oh, and some advice: If you are ever in Federal Hill and visit the Spoons coffee house, don't bother the woman writing on her laptop.

22 years ago, Eliza Benedict became briefly famous as the only one of serial killer Walter Bowman's victims to survive. Now, Bowman has contacted Eliza through an intermediary and says he wants to meet her. Laura Lippman deftly sets up this chilling premise within the first few pages, and the rest of the book is a steady, inexorable tightening of the tension towards Eliza's confrontation with the man who so irrevocably altered her life.

The premise of a serial killer manipulating someone from inside prison walls inevitably invites a comparison to Thomas Harris' Hannibal Lecter books. But quiet, apparently contrite Walter manages to be creepy in a much more subtle and ultimately more disturbing way that the more lurid fictional serial killers. I can put down Harris and breathe easy in the belief knowing a real criminal super-genius like Lecter doesn't exist outside of fiction; I know Walter Bowmans exist in the real world.

Which brings us to another great thing about this book, and about Laura Lippman's work in general: her mastery of the small, mundane details of modern American middle-class suburban life and how she juxtaposes the everyday with the horribly out-of-joint to make the evil seem even more unsettling. Stephen King does this a lot as well, but unlike King, you can always depend on Laura Lippman to bring things to a satisfying ending.

Superb craftsmanship, characters you can believe, steadily building suspense and a great ending...yep, it's a Laura Lippman book all right, and one of her best.

When Eliza Benedict was fifteen years old, she stumbled upon a man in the woods. He was burying his latest rape/murder victim, but Eliza (then Elizabeth Lerner) didn’t know that. Walter decides he can’t let her go, and kidnaps the poor girl, taking her for a nearly 40 day tour of several eastern states.

Years later, Eliza receives a letter from Walter, who is on death row, his sentence about to be carried out. Not only is this creepy, but even more astounding is Eliza’s willingness to allow contact between herself and her assailant.

This is one of those crime/fiction/summer reads that allow the reader to easily plow through 300 pages in one sitting. (I did that yesterday!). Although it’s not my usual genre, it was entertaining. It reminded me of one of those episodes of Law and Order: SVU – you are just channel surfing and before you know it, you are caught up and can’t help but watch the entire show.

This suspenseful, at times spooky book falls into the "page turner" category of novel as the reader learns bit by bit about the frightening experiences of Elizabeth Lerner, a teenage girl, kidnapped by a serial killer, who for some unknown reason, lets her live. As an adult with a happy marriage and two children, Elizabeth, having changed her name to Eliza Benedict believes she has left behind the horrors of that teenage experience. Suddenly she is thrust into fear and anguish again when her abductor, Walter Bowman, only weeks away from his execution by lethal injection, contacts her.

Now Eliza must come to grips with the long suppressed horror of her kidnapping and decide if she should give in to Walter's seemingly humble and contrite efforts to re-establish contact with her. Will writing and talking to him bring her and her family back into the spotlight? Will he reveal information about the undiscovered burial sites of his other victims? Does Warren hold some ulterior motive in wanting to connect with her?

This book is written from various points of view, and moves back and forth in time with ease, so the reader has a chance to understand the experiences, feelings, motivations and hidden purposes of several key players. This is a disturbing book at times, but it is ultimately a very engrossing and intriguing story. Once hooked in, it's hard to put it down!

Eliza Benedict is a woman with a beautiful family and very idyllic life when a letter from a death-row inmate forces her to look once again into her past. The letter is from Walter Bowman, the man who kidnapped Eliza when she was 15 years old and who kept her hostage for weeks. He claims he only wants to apologize before he is executed but as the story progresses you learn Walter has an ulterior motive. The story switches from present to the summer when Eliza was kidnapped.

Lippman is a skillful writer and you find yourself quickly engaged in Eliza's and Walter's story. The novel also takes a good look at the Death Penalty and makes you take a look of the issue from both sides. However, I think this story is misrepresented. People categorize it as a mystery or thriller, but It's more of a character study on how one handles tragedy and how it effects those around them even 23 years later. I expected suspense, mystery, and intrigue when in actuality the novel has very little suspense. Despite the lack of mystery and suspense it was still an interesting read - just not what I expected.

I've long admired Laura Lippman's work, having read a handful of her Tess Monaghan novels and several of her stand-alones. She's marvelously gifted at the craft of writing -- I don't think many would argue with that. And I was intrigued by this novel's conceit: a woman contacted by her long-ago kidnapper, a man on death row for killing another victim (and perhaps many others). But while I read this book pretty much cover-to-cover, I never felt the rush of excitement I so often do by my favorite authors who know how to push a narrative and engage the reader with a seemingly real, complex and fascinating alternate world.

I'd Know You Anywhere bounces backwards and forwards numerous times from the present to 1985, when the lead character, Elizabeth (later Eliza), was kidnapped for 39 days. The scenes with her kidnapper should have been thrilling; instead, they were curiously devoid of suspense, for the most part. Although Lippman deals with the question of why Elizabeth failed to escape when presented with numerous opportunities, the explanations fail to convince, which hurt this reader's ability to suspend the disbelief attendant on all fiction. And Walter Bowman, the killer/kidnapper, is one of the most boring "bad guys" I can ever recall reading about. He comes off as a cardboard cutout. The scenes in the present, meanwhile, are far from suspenseful; the reader never gets the impression Eliza is in any real danger, psychologically or otherwise. There's far too much ink on the paper that readers tend to skip (as Elmore Leonard would put it) ... much articulation of minds turning over this thought and that. To what end? Ultimately, I came not to feel passionately -- one way or the other -- about Eliza. I, like quite a few others, it appears, was bored. And the face-to-face meeting between Eliza and Walter at the end was a rather weak payoff. In short, the novel's interesting premise was brought to life in a quite mediocre novel, redeemed only because of Lippman's considerable talents as a wordsmith.

Laura Lippman, is the author of numerous books, Hardly Knew Her, The Girl in the Green Raincoat, and What the Dead Know to name a few. This new novel, I'd Know You Anywhere, is a suspenseful pschological thriller, about a woman who was kidnapped when she was 15 and held captive for over 5 weeks. As the story is told, the reader becomes familiar with Eliza and how she coped after she was rescued. Now that her captor has found out where she is and wants to see her, the reader gets to know Eliza and the people in her life . According to what the author has said, this story is loosely based on real events. At times I had a difficult time reading this book, but as I read more the story started coming together for me. This was the first Laura Lippman book I have read and I felt I owed it to the author to continue. I am glad that I did stay with it because I ended up enjoying the book. Any fans of Laura Lippman will enjoy reading this book. Her next novel, The Most Dangerous Thing will be released in August 2011.

The book starts out with an interesting concept. A young teenager was kidnapped and raped by a man who, 20 years later, is about to be executed for the murder of another girl and wants to meet the grown woman.. The book shuttles back and forth between the present time, and the time of the actual event. The woman, who has changed her name from Elizabeth to Eliza, in hopes of leaving that victimized girl behind her, is now faced with confronting the crime again as she contemplates meeting the kidnapper again.

It could have been so much better but the author cheats, in my opinion. It's almost like the author, herself, didn't want poor Eliza to confront any possibility of her own guilt. She makes her the shining, innocent victim of the totally depraved villain who deserved no mercy, only death. People who believe that some people are totally good and others are totally bad, will like this. Also folks who share Eliza's privileged background and East Coast PC viewpoints may resonate with these characters. The good characters, Eliza's family, of course are all very good, even if the sister is a little egocentric and the daughter is a little bratty. These are just tiny warts on their otherwise wonderful natures. The bad characters are the "others." Barbara LaFortuny who has, not only a funny last name, but a terrible hairstyle..the true mark of someone not to take seriously. And Trudy, the mother of the pretty blond girl, is another woman we are supposed to hate because she is Southern, descended from old Southerners, is Catholic, has lots of money, is pretty and has has a beautiful, blond daughter..all the hallmarks of someone we are supposed to hate. In the audio version, she is read with an exaggerated southern accent, where our heroine is blissfully free of any regional twang. Likewise the odious Jarred Garret, scum of the scum, has a bowling ball of a belly, a wife who watches reality shows, is an accountant from Philadelphia. The classist, scorn is written all through this book. And if you are fortunate enough to be in Eliza's elite group you will probably relate to her.

I could go on and on about the flaws in the concept of the characters and their actions but the book isn't worth it, to me. I will only say that it might have been a much richer, more realistic and rewarding read if our poor heroine, finally realizes that she might have had some romantic attachment to the villain. And perhaps some jealousy of the rich, much more beautiful blond girl. She has protested over and over, when others had accused her of being complicit in the kidnapping of Holly, that she only obeyed Walter out of fear. Yet Eliza has put forth the idea that Barbara LaFortuny's interest in Walter was not just out of idealism. Project much, Eliza? Eliza's failure to adapt to any of her surroundings, her inability to stand up to her troubled teenager who was clearly screaming for limits, her choice of marrying a perfect caretaker and provider of a man whose work she doesn't even understand, are all symptomatic of her inability to face the past. So far the author got it right...but she failed to show us the real reason for Eliza's emotional blocks..her inability to face herself.. She did give us the jail house confession of Walter that she was the only woman he'd ever been able to make love to, and that he loved her. This would have been the perfect opportunity to realize that she'd possibly had some romantic attachment to him too. But no, our Eliza can't go there and and she lets Walter go to his death, with the verdict that he was the totally Guilty One and she was the totally Innocent One stand.

This could have been a much more realisitc, satisfying work if the author had freed her characters to take on their own lives. But
she keeps Eliza constrained to the end, the passive, good girl who couldn't act to save Holly, to the good character who does all the right things, and goes on to live her picture perfect life with her perfect rich husband in the rich suburbs of DC. And gee she even joins the neighborhood book club.

I'd love to see a sequel in which the bratty Iso, who has never been disciplined, becomes an ax murderer and Eliza has to visit her on Death Row.

When Eliza Benedict was 15, she was kidnapped and held hostage for six weeks. Now a stay-at-home mom with a two kids of her own, Eliza has settled into a peaceful, suburban, upper middle class life. Unexpectedly, Eliza is contacted by her kidnapper, Walter Bowman, who is on death row for the murder of other kidnapped girls. As his execution date draws near, Walter asks Eliza to revisit her kidnapping and come clean about some of the details he believes she misrepresented during his trial. Will Eliza's memories help Walter get the stay of execution he desires? And will Eliza be able to protect her family from her past?

This book is difficult to classify. It's not a thriller or suspense novel - we already know the crux of Eliza and Walter's relationship and there's no feeling of impending doom. It's not a mystery - we already know "who done it." Maybe it's a post-suspense psychological drama, focusing on Eliza's recovery and the impact on her family, her marriage, her children, and the decisions she's made about her own place in the world.

I have been a fan of Laura Lippman's Tess Monaghan series for a long time. Tess is spunky, loyal, smart, and a Baltimore girl through and through. The Monaghan books are witty, contemporary, slightly jaded, and cool. In contrast, I'm finding Lippman's standalones to be much darker, deeper, and more psychologically gripping. The reader really gets to know Eliza's motivations and understand her choices. You know her curiosity about Walter and can see why she responds to his requests while trying to protect her family. Most refreshingly, Eliza is a victim of a horrible crime who doesn't act victimized. She's taken control of her life and it amazingly well adjusted. Lippman's ability to balance the horror of the crime with the triumph of a life well lived is striking.

Patricia Highsmith. Mary Higgins Clark. Sue Grafton. They are as foreign to me as their literary forte - the crime novel. I read James Patterson once (Kiss The Girls), but once was enough for me to realize that it just wasn't for me, being a lover of literary fiction first and foremost. So imagine my surprise when I picked up this work by detective fiction writer Laura Lippman and found it to be probably one of the better books I'll ever read within its genre, namely the psychological thriller.

"Still, I'd know you anywhere." They are the words contained within a brief yet salient letter suburban housewife Eliza Benedict receives one day, words that serve to remind her that her face and identity (formerly Elizabeth Lerner) have been burned into the memory banks of a killer. They are penned by one Walter Bowman, a man who kidnapped and raped her when she was fifteen years old and now sits on death row. Though the day of his execution looms large, Eliza is unnerved that he has found her and begins to relive the simultaneous curiosity and terror she felt in his presence, those feelings manifested throughout detailed recollections of the 39 days she spent with him. All the while he pushes for more communication, exercising a calm and complimentary comportment to serve ulterior motives. Eliza must contend with him as well as others with whom he has formidable connections, eventually gaining the resolve she sought and failed to attain all those years ago.

I dare to use a phrase other critics have for various works, and call this book compulsively readable. There is one small hump to get over at the start - Lippman overdoses a little on the mundanity of the protagonist's life but once Eliza receives the letter that sets everything in motion, that opens a locked door to her past, the reader will find themselves turning page after page and marvel as they realize they have been reading for a few hours and they are already in the middle of the story (If I'd had the time, I would've read it in one sitting).

Lippman's pacing is taut, her writing to the point and her characters interesting, if not gripping. Eliza is a simple woman, perfectly content to "let life happen to her" and can come off somewhat dull and devoid of a personality. The strongest female characters within the story are Barbara Lafortuny, a victim of a knife attack who tirelessly campaigns to keep Walter alive and Trudy Tackett, the mother of one of Walter's victims, consistently blaming Eliza's failure to act as the reason for her daughter's death. Walter is not a frightening portrayal of a serial murderer - rather, he is somewhat meek with a bit of an inferiority complex, Eliza remarking that he is diminutive in size and ego, terribly misinformed about women and matters in general, and even naïve. However, Walter becomes much more menacing when he employs humility and kindness in his manipulation, thinking Eliza weak and using her desire to believe in the good of people to bring her closer.

The reader is kept at attention with the consistent switching of perspectives and time (the novel moves between 1985 and present day). Chapters are short, encouraging just a few more minutes of reading each time one reaches the end. At 370 pages, it is longer than the average novel but there are likely to be few complaints about its length when the degree of absorption is so high.

Bottom line: Though Lippman primarily writes in a genre that isn't my cup of tea, "I'd Know You Anywhere" has me interested in her other work. I consider this book a bridge from one genre to another, one that doesn't follow strict guidelines and manages to blend the drama of literature with the straightforward storytelling of crime thrillers/detective fiction. It is an excellent book about one woman learning to conquer many old fears.

Can anyone really put the past behind you -- particularly when that past includes being kidnapped by a serial killer yet somehow making it out alive? By all outward appearances, Eliza Benedict has done just that. She lives in suburban Maryland with her perfect husband, perfect (almost) kids, and white picket fence. But she still can't sleep with the windows open.

Her carefully sheltered world may be headed for an upset though when she gets an unexpected letter from her captor -- now on death row. Apparently, he wants to connect with her and give her the information she's been wondering about for decades (Why did SHE escape? Were there more the police never found?). But is he really attempting to make amends, or does he have his own agenda? Eliza will have to get close to find out.

While extremely well-written, the basic premise had me raising my eyebrows. Eliza seems to take all the occurrences in stride, never for a moment wondering if she SHOULDN'T allow this man back into her life. She even puts a separate phone line into her house, just so he has a dedicated line to call on! Her husband, Peter, also seems strangely apathetic about the whole thing.

I won't give away the plot, but I will say that I didn't find Eliza to be the most sympathetic of characters. She was kind of blah. I expected her to have more of a backbone, more of a stance, more of SOMETHING. Instead, she kind of just drifted along.

I expected a thrilling page-turner, but thrilling this wasn't. All the same, it was an interesting, well-written book.

I'd Know You Anywhere by Laura Lippman
William Morrow, 2010
370 pages
4.5/5 stars

Source: Library

Summary: Eliza Benedict used to be Elizabeth Lerner until she was kidnapped by Walter Bowman at the age of fifteen. Somehow she lived while his other victims died; somehow she is the girl who got away. Now Walter is about to be executed but he is reaching out again to Eliza in the hope of getting her to remember those 39 days and nights they were together.

Thoughts: Somebody recommended Lippman so I put this on my list and then happened to see it at the library: it was serendipity! Right away I was drawn in to the story. I loved Eliza right away, a somewhat shrinking flower, a devoted mother, someone still broken from her experience. But she does grow and while the ending is optimistic, there are definitely still problems in her life.

There were also some very awful characters. Barbara is a woman who has become an advocate for Walter and intervenes in Eliza's life in a busybody manner. Trudy is the mother of a girl who didn't get away who is waiting only for Walter's death, the justice she's been wanting for over twenty years. She doesn't hesitate to interpose in to Eliza's life.

Walter of course is a man who killed at least one girl and kidnapped Eliza. He was bizarre with very odd ideas about appearance and difficulties in social interactions. He also was able to manipulate Eliza and continues to hold strings to her with possible frightening effects on her family.

One of the most interesting aspects to me was the sibling relationship between Iso and Albie. Albie adores his older sister but she resents him. That broke my heart as I remembered some of the harsh ways I behaved toward my sister. Now we are older and well she's a teenager and I wish I could go back and appreciate her unwavering adoration of me. This wasn't the largest aspect but it resonated with me.

Overall: Gripping story introducing a new to me author, whose other works I definitely want to read!

Cover: Hmmm, I think I like it better in person as it's very shiny and eye-catching.

Laura Lippman's new book, "I'd Know You Anywhere" was a disappointing book from start to finish. I kept reading with the hope that the book would improve, that I would grow to care about the characters and that I would learn something about my values. Unfortunately, none of my hopes came to fruition. The story line about a young girl's kidnapping and rape from the perspective of her as an adult woman with children of her own could have been a compelling one. Instead it seemed flat and sad, much like the main character.

Lippman missed opportunities to cause her readers to think about the death penalty in new ways. Her stereotypical characters represented different versions of the victims of crime. She includes the impact of violent crimes on the family members of the victims themselves yet we do not feel the sadness or empathy we would like to feel for the victims because the characters were not well defined. I plodded through the current life of the victim interspersed with the time frame of the crime. We meet the perpetrator of all of the crimes yet he too is flat.

This reader will be reluctant to ever read another book by the author without waiting for a string of great reviews.

Guest Review by JER

Lippman is a fantastic writer. Her novels suck you in and you find it difficult to put them down. Such is the case in "I'd know you anywhere", which traces of Eliza Benedict - currently and adult - who was abducted when she was 15 by someone now on death row Walter Bowman. Bowman wants to meet with Benedict primarily because he is nearing his execution day and is out of time and appeals. The plot follows as Walter makes contact with Benedict and begins rekindling a connection that existed many years ago. Benedict is a sympathetic character in some ways, having steeled her trauma from intruding on her current life. The writing moves from past to present efficiently, the plot is not without its "implausibles", and yet in the end it is a compelling read despite the less than sewn-up ending.

Eliza has recently moved back to her native Maryland from England with her successful husband and two bright children. She's finally feeling reasonably secure in her life when she gets an unexpected letter from Walter, the man who kidnapped her when she was 15 and is now scheduled for execution for murders he committed with her as a witness. Does her kidnapper finally want to talk to her so he can confess to other crimes? To explain why he left her alive when he killed the others? Or is he still toying with her, just because he can?

Lippman is one of my go-to authors for intelligently written literary thrillers, and I'D KNOW YOU ANYWHERE was such a great read, it even surpassed WHAT THE DEAD KNOW as my favorite of hers.

For the first part of the book, Lippman alternates chapters between the present and 1985, giving us a complete picture of Eliza now and as a teen and showing how the person Eliza is today was greatly affected by her harrowing experience with Walter.

Walter is a very fascinating kind of killer. He's not your typical evil mastermind, just a confused sort of guy who stumbles into murder because he's bad with women.

Later on in the book, we get insight into a couple of other characters - an anti-death penalty activist who has befriended Walter and hopes Eliza can deliver some sort of testimony that will stay his execution and the mother of one of the girls Walter killed (Holly) who blames Eliza for not doing more to help her daughter.

And that brings me to one of the book's central questions: Could Eliza have done more? There are people who believe by not fighting back, Eliza was an accomplice in Holly's death. But there are also those who believe not fighting back is what kept Eliza alive. Should she feel guilty? It's all very thought provoking.

I decided on this book because of the great reviews. I got the audio copy and that was a mistake, because even though the reader was excellent, the characters were flat and undeveloped. I would have skimmed through the book but you just can't do that with audio. I could not find sympathy for the main character, Eliza Benedict, as she was so bland throughout. I kept plodding away thinking at some point the story would pick up. It made me think about how Charles Dickens was paid by the word... perhaps Laura Lippman was too? 384 pages - well, the story would have fit nicely into 100... it had tremendous potential but fell terribly short.

I am giving 2 stars as I think that is where you will find the most realistic reviews.

Fifteen years ago Eliza (formerly known as Elizabeth Lerner) was kidnapped and raped by serial killer Walter Bowman. Having escaped her past (even changing her name) Eliza is determined to forget the past and build a "happy" home with her successful husband and two kids (one who suffers from nightmares while the other is a bully in training). Having recently moved back to the US from London, Eliza is startled to receive a letter from her kidnapper on death row that proclaims "I'd know you anywhere". These very words would reopen old wounds and painful memories of the summer when she was 15. As she tries to navigate her old and new feelings, she also struggles to protect those she loves (much like she did as a child) and determine why he has contacted her so close to his execution. Ironically, it will be Eliza, who was once the victim, who will now hold Walter's fate.

Things I liked about the story...the premise, the presentation and character portrayals. Things I didn't like about the story....there were things that could have been expounded upon, and some very unnecessary references to race.

Presentation: The "parts" of the book began with titles of Billboard Hot 100 song titles. Within these parts are short chapters that fluctuate between the present and the summer of 1985, when Eliza was victimized. The music selected seemed to parallel the events that were happening in the story.

Character portrayals: Each character has a different perspective or viewpoint of what happened that fateful day in the summer of 1985, as well as what is happening in the present. Whether they were the victim/survivor, the murderer, the over-zealous advocate, or the family of the survivor, they each brought a certain realistic quality to the story. Because I work in the Criminal Justice System, I can attest to the fact that people often react much like they did in the story. From how Eliza reacted, to the way Walter viewed himself, are classic examples of how victims, survivors and defendants typically react. It is also not uncommon to find a female or even a child, who cooperates with their abusers in order to save their lives, or possibly the lives of their loved ones. Remember that is why some in society prey these segments of society because they can be easily controlled with fear and intimidation. Some survivors experience extreme "guilt" about living and begin to question why were lucky enough to be spared. While some may view Eliza's missed opportunities of escape as "cooperation", a lot of victims act this same way out of self preservation. There is no one explanation of why victims act or respond as they sometimes do, but ultimately it might be a person's sense of self-preservation and survival (a desire to stay alive) that compels them. In the story, Eliza was a self-conscious teen, awkward in her own body, who literally stumbled upon the devil one afternoon while trying to have some forbidden fun. Jump ahead to Peter, the understanding husband who allows his wife to decide how she wants to handle contacting the man who victimized her. He is simply satisfied to be her support if she needs him and easily accepts her decision. Then there is the manipulative Walter, who has contacted his (surviving) victim under the guise that he wants to communicate before his pending execution. And while Walter is a man who some view as handsome (on the outside) underneath he is disturbed, ugly man with an agenda. Walter's character never lets us forget that he is a true predator whose goal is to satisfy his thirst. There is the over zealous advocate (Barbara) who champions causes (like Walter and other inmates) and has made it her life's mission to save those that she feels can be rehabilitated. Having survived a brush with violence herself, Barbara will stop at nothing to get what she wants. Then there was the still grieving mother (Trudy) who seems on the surface to have it all together, but inside is falling apart. Trudy spends every living moment waiting to see the man who killed her daughter pay with his life. And finally, there are the members of Eliza's family (specifically her sister Vonnie) who had to live through her disappearance (fearing the worse), and rebuild their lives when (or if) their loved ones return. All of these characters lives intersect with one another and in the end weave a decent story.

Overall, I liked this book...initially I thought I would love it (for the premise and the realism) but I had a few problems in the end. While the ending was completely believable, there were some things that fell flat. There was a ton of build up, but a somewhat anticlimactic showdown that I could not decide if it was rushed or forced. While some parts of the book were a little drawn out, I felt something was missing. I don't know if I wanted to see some real difference in her daughter, the killer, or the grieving mother, but I wanted something more, which would have ensured that this was a dynamic read. And in conclusion, I also didn't get all the forced references to race. It just seemed a little thrown in there and I thought that it could have been left out of a story. So I give this story a 3.5 to 4.

I'D KNOW YOU ANYWHERE is a superior and satisfying novel of psychological suspense. The focus of the book is Eliza a thirty something, upper middle class, suburban D.C. housewife with a successful caring husband, a bratty thirteen year old and a sweet elementary school age son. But something horrible happened to her the summer she was fifteen that is intruding on her present pleasant life. She had stumbled upon a serial killer, Walter, burying his latest victim. Not wanting a witness Walter had forced her in his truck and kept her subdued with threats for over a month as they moved between various campsites and cheap motels. Walter was discovered by the authorities and Eliza rescued but not before another girl died. Some twenty years later Walter is on death row for his crimes with just weeks to live when he seeks contact with Eliza and wants her to come see him. Eliza has lived for years trying to cover up her involvement with this sensational crime spree but Walter knows her well and how to set the bait to make her visit.

In the character of Walter, Laura Lippman has created a plausible and pathetic villain. This socially inept guy apparently just wanted a girlfriend but every time he picked up a girl it ended real badly - especially for the girl. Eliza was never really his type but when she accidentally saw too much she became his unwilling companion and she is an appealing heroine. Other well drawn characters include Trudy the grieving mother of one of Walter's victims and Barbara a retired teacher who becomes Walter's advocate. Lippman flavors her story with lots of popular culture references and anecdotes from the present and 1985 when the crimes happened that really bring the setting to life. And she keeps the reader interested until the very end. This is the first novel by Laura Lippman I have read but it won't be my last

What happens to the victims of crime after the event? Lippman looks at one young girl , Eliza, who was kidnapped and eventually raped by a serial killer, Walter, as a teenager. Due to a little respect on the sociopaths end, and just a dash of Stockholm syndrome on the victims part, he chooses not to kill her. He ends up on death row and she goes on to forge a new life and identity as a wife and mother.

With the execution date rising some 20 years later and his delay tactics all spent, Walter has one last ploy. Can he convince Eliza to repay her debt? Through subtle means he worms his way back into her life and pushes her to the brink once more. Will she ever be free?

I have talked about my complaints with mainstream American crime fiction before with its over the top violence, overly intelligent criminals, and excessively Rube Goldberg machine crimes, they are anything but believable or remotely scary. Go find the latest Patterson if that is your taste. But if you want an intelligent crime book about the psychological issues dealing with the intimacy between victim and perpetrator, you can do no better than this. Just like Room (Emma Donoghue) tore apart the immediate recovery of a horrific crime, Lippman masterfully delves into the relationship forged, for better or worse, during crimes.

With a case like Elizabeth Smart's going on out in Utah this book brings up a fascinating question. Can the victim ever be free from their victimizer? Prison and time do not seem to heal all wounds. The true change must come from within the person themselves. As the great Viktor Frankl said:

Everything can be taken from a man or a woman but one thing: the last of human freedoms to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.

Granted it is easier said than done, but I always try to remember the Frankl managed to formulate his philosophy while a prisoner in a concentration camp during the Holocaust. So all things are possible, it is after all a journey that takes time. To emphasis this point we are introduced to a smaller character, the mother of Walter's last victim. Her whole life has been on hold and shows no signs of moving forward. She is not ready to let go and as such will remain a prisoner, cut off from all enjoyment. At the end this book is the story of one sufferer's triumph over herself; to let go of those misplaced feelings of guilt and blame. To finally sleep with the windows open.

I am curious if the name Eliza is not a tribute to Eliza Doolittle, another young girl who struggles to overcome herself and change her life. Probably not but it does work in some ways.

When Eliza was fifteen, she was kidnapped and held captive for weeks by a man who raped and killed young women. He let her go. He's now on death row, and she receives a letter from him that shatters her present world. She changed her name from Elizabeth to Eliza, took her husband's name and never speaks of the event.

I wouldn't describe as a mystery. The central mystery, if you can call it that, is the lingering effect of kidnapping. The novel is told in alternating chapters of the summer of 1985, Elizabeth's summer with Walter, and the present day. I found it to be somewhat interesting but incredibly slow-placed. Initially I thought it would be a psychological thriller, but as the pages turned, I found it to be a psychological introspection. It is fascinating and disturbing to get so deeply inside the mind of Walter, and the novel does explore humanity in the face of crime well. There is a lot of discussion about the death penalty (as the novel takes place in the D.C. area, the differing politics of Virginia and Maryland are discussed at length.) Part of my disappointment with this novel stemmed from my assumption it was a mystery. Lippman is a good writer, but this book straddles a few genres. It may disappoint mystery fans, frighten literary fiction fans, and not be gory enough for psychological thriller fans, but somewhere between the three it will intrigue and appeal to an audience more than it did to me.

Despite Lippman's strong writing and an interesting subject, I thought this novel was too long and too slow. I was expecting a mystery, but I got a close look at the lingering psychological impact of kidnapping. I'd rather watch an episode of Criminal Minds.

I'D KNOW YOU ANYWHERE by Laura Lippman.

The author does nice dialogue. Draws good pictures of interesting characters. I was intrigued with Eliza's older sister Vonnie and Eliza's daughter Iso. Vonnie and Iso were mean. Vonnie pinched Eliza as a baby and did other hurtful things as they were growing up. Iso lied, bullied, and stole. They were a contrast from Eliza who floated through life reacting to things. Eliza was not a take charge person. That was probably why Walter didn't kill her. At age 15 she was kidnaped and held for 39 days. He told her he would kill her family if she didn't do what he asked, and she believed him. She had many chances to run or ask for help, but she didn't. She could not rescue herself.

About half the story is current day and half 1985. In current day Walter is on death row and makes contact with Eliza wanting her to do something for him. We don't learn until the end of the book what that is. The publisher's blurb says "a terrible truth that Eliza kept buried inside." I didn't see that. There was no terrible truth. I saw it more as will Eliza do what he asks, or will she not, and why? There is not much plot to this book, other than watching the 1985 kidnaping. Much of the story is watching Eliza think about the past and what she knows.

We are told Walter killed other girls. I wanted to know more about those.

Walter is good looking but after a moment of interaction, women avoid him as if they are repulsed. It had to do with him looking away when a normal person would look at you. And he looks at you or your body when a normal person would not. That intrigued me. I needed to know more. I wanted to know what was going through their minds when women and girls interacted with him and rejected him.

Although Vonnie and Iso were secondary characters, I wanted more done with them. I wanted to see them change or something redeeming. If not, I wanted to see them get pay back for their meanness. But that was not what this book was about. At the end of the book, I felt an emptiness, something unfinished, about them.

I did not like jumping around in time. Some of it was ok when a large chunk of time is spent in 1985 and then a large chunk in current day. But jumping around within one day annoyed me. For example. X arrives at Eliza's house but Eliza is not home. The daughter Iso lets X in to wait inside. The scene switches to Eliza who is at a meeting at school. The scene switches to Walter in prison pondering things. The scene switches to Eliza and her husband that night. The scene switches back to the afternoon when Eliza returns home from her school meeting and talks to X.

The narrator Linda Emond is one of the better ones. Her voice is calm and pleasant to the ear. Her pauses and interpretations are good.

DATA:
Narrative mode: 3rd person. Unabridged audiobook length: 11 hrs and 11 mins. Swearing language: none that I recall. Sexual language: the f word used once. Number of sex scenes: one rape scene briefly described, no explicit details. Setting: current day and 1985 mostly Maryland, Virginia, and D.C. area. Book copyright: 2010. Genre: mystery.

Wow...another remarkable read by Laura Lipmann. Ms. Lippman has excellent portrayals of the characters, a great storyline, and vivid descriptions of situations and gripping scenes. You can just feel the emotions of each character.

A perfect family, a tranquil life and then......after 20 years a letter arrives in the mail. Not a friendly letter, but one from someone you would not want to remember.

Eliza lives with her husband and two children in Maryland and has a secret from her teenage years that she wants to forget, but the letter brings the nightmare back and also brings a decision about whether to reply or just ignore the communication.

After she makes a decision, a phone call from the sender, along with his continued, manipulative influence further complicates the situation.

We, the readers, relive Eliza's nightmare of the terror and control she had to endure as we also follow Eliza in her present life.

"There was a bond. He could make her do anything. Wasn't that proof of something between them? He had granted her life." Page 276

My rating is 5/5 - you won't want to put it down. It is pretty intense and frightening how someone could have such power over another human being.

Unlike most reviewers I will be short and sweet. DISAPPOINTING. I purchased this book because of the rave reviews and was totally disappointed. Why? Even though the main character had been kidnapped and raped, she just wasn't interesting or sympathetic. She was boring. She never really interacted with anyone and when she did, she acted stupid. Her reasons for keeping in touch with and seeing Walter just didn't add up. Her husband may as well have been a robot for all his emotion (this was a big minus for me). Why was he so nonchalant about Walter contacting his wife? Why didn't he go with Eliza to the prison to see Walter rather than Vonnie(a completely unlikeable character? Eliza didn't seem to be fazed by Barbara showing up; for all Eliza know, Barbara could have been dangerous to her and her family. The ending was a bummer: we never got back to Iso or her obvious problems. We also never heard from Eliza's parents on what they experienced during
Eliza's abduction. This book did not live up to all the ballyhoo and raves about it. Good thing I can sell the book back to the store!!

Laura Lippman departs from her Tess Monaghan detective series to write a psychological novel focused on two individuals: Eliza Benedict and Walter Bowman. In her novel, I'd Know You Anywhere, Lippman explores the lives of these two individuals with intensity, both in the current time, and twenty years earlier. Walter kidnapped Eliza when she was a teen. Now, he's on death row for his conviction in killing another teen. He contacts her in a desire to avoid his execution. Lippman unveils what happened in the past and what it means today, for both characters. Readers who like psychological novels are those most likely to enjoy this one.

Rating: Three-star (Recommended)

This is labeled Mystery/Suspense. This book should be labeled strictly General or Psychological Fiction and I would have enjoyed it as such, but I kept waiting for some big revelation that would take me by surprise. It never happened. This is a story about a 15 year old girl who stumbles into the path of serial killer Walter Bowman. Not fitting his pattern he keeps the then "Elizabeth" as his traveling partner for weeks. Elizabeth's ordeal is told in flashbacks throughout the book. It is truly frightening. Out of complete fear and desire to survive she is totally manipulated by this man. On the last night of her kidnapping Walter kills again and does something absolutely horrible to Elizabeth. Years later the adult Elizabeth now called Eliza Benedict is happily married with two children. When the killer is set to be executed for his crimes he contacts Eliza hoping for a meeting. The story follows Eliza as she tries to hide her past form her children and make the difficult decision to speak and see this man who tormented her as a teenager. The story also focuses on Barbara LaFortuny, a friend of prisoners and an advocate against the death penalty. The final confrontation between victim and perpetrator was outstanding.

Eliza Benedict has the distinction of being "the one that got away". She was kidnapped by serial killer Walter Bowman in 1985 when she was fifteen years old and was held hostage for six weeks. She's always wondered why she was the only girl that Walter left alive. Eliza is now married with two children. One day she receives a letter out of the blue from Walter, who is now on death row for his crimes. Will she finally find out why Walter spared her? Or is Walter still manipulating her all these years later?

This was a fascinating crime drama. I thought the author did a great job of showing how Eliza's kidnapping affected not only her but the people around her. Even Eliza's two children were deeply affected despite the fact that Eliza hid the crime from them and they had no idea their mother was a kidnapping victim. I found the story unpredictable yet authentic. I was bothered by one thing - Lippman's author's note at the back of the book states that this book was inspired by a true crime but she's not going to say which one. Of course that makes me want to know even more! If anyone happens to know what crime Lippman is referring to, please put me out of my misery.

I purchased this book with a slight bit of trepidation. I like to think but don't enjoy being horrified or grossed out and it's hard to know what the advertisers mean when they say "pychological suspense" or "creepy." Laura Lippman's book, i'd know you anywhere, is suspenseful but she brings you to the edge of creepy and then pulls you back and prompts you to ponder the characters' various perspectives. Wow... I am so impressed with the depth of thought and the unique composition of this story. Thank you, Laura Lippman. Not only did I enjoy thinking (without being creeped or grossed out... much), I could not put this book down. The only negative I have to share is that I did have a bit of a stiff neck for a day or two. I truly just couldn't put the thing down until I finished it.

~WallerBean~

Elizabeth is a young woman, fifteen years old, who was in a classic wrong place at the wrong time, the place where a serial killer just finished burying a body. She sees the mound, the shovel, and the man and he's not likely to leave her where she stands. The position of this girl hardly ever seems to change for readers even as she is also an adult. It's hard not to think, "Run!" or "Why did you do that?" or "Well don't do that!" but she never runs away, never explains, and always goes ahead anyway.

Eliza, as a wife and mother has buried her past, by moving away from it, changing her name, from Elizabeth to Eliza, later remaining unknown behind her married name, turning as far as possible from the young woman who was kidnapped and held hostage by the serial killer. She moved away from the questions, like why wasn't she killed like the others, why didn't she ask for help when she was alone, and why didn't she run when she had chances, why didn't she tell when Walter had a hostage with them and she was sent into a McDonald's alone? She walked away from a lot of questions.

There are ways in which Lippman just makes it all fit together so beautifully. There are so many characters who are so beautifully drawn. When Elizabeth is looking into window reflections while she is on a walk, trying to catch herself as she looks, unposed, instead of posed and prepared for her reflection, she remembers her sister calling her nose a "pig snout." Then, "Elizabeth had asked her mother if she could have a nose job for her sixteenth birthday and her mother had been unable to speak for several seconds, a notable thing unto itself," as her mother is a psychiatrist. These moments help clarify a character and make them seem so much more real.

Lippman moves amongst the characters with utter clarity and ease. They are drawn fairly and accurately; even when they are foolish, mean, arrogant, all are drawn with a sense of fairness that transcends the smallness of their beings. If anything, the character who is hardest to fathom is Eliza. She seems deceptive, even to herself, which leaves a lot for the reader to figure out.

You always know what character you are reading and whether it is past or present, as the stories seem to be moving forward in a kind of parallel universe where they must collide.

Laura Lippman sucks you into her novel in the first few pages and then spits you out at the other end when she is finished with you. She's just that good. It's impossible to start reading a Laura Lippman novel and walk away from it. Even while you aren't reading it, the characters, the dilemnas are still with you. Her writing, her characters, her story - all are engaging. Her books are always a surprise.

The book started slow, picked up about a quarter of the way through and then declined badly. There was a lot of hope it would get better, hopefully a surprise climax, but NOTHING to make this read worthwhile.
Vapid, shallow characters that are almost unreal. Unbelievable plot. Late introduction of oddball characters that the author needed to finish the story.
I'm sorry I didn't stop reading when I first thought about it.

I have never read Laura Lippman before and really enjoyed this book. I found her portrayal of victim and perpetrator to be fascinating.

I found myself, however, wanting to shake Eliza out of her fog. Why on earth did she allow this man back into her life? Why did she install a private phone line so he could call her? This didn't make sense to me, although in many ways, she fell right back into the victim role with him, the only role she knew. Just say "No," Eliza! Or say nothing and walk away! But she didn't or couldn't do this, apparently out of fear her story would be exposed.

I was waiting for a great ending, almost a "Sixth Sense" or "Primal Fear" kind of twist ending...but this didn't happen. It was actually quite disappointing. I wondered all along if Elizabeth played a more significant role in a key event (those who have read the book will know what I mean) and expected this to be the big secret that was alluded to during the course of the book. The ending was quite a let-down. No big revelation, no great secret, seems kind of silly actually.

All things considered, I much prefer the Tess Monaghan books, but I have to admit, this one was captivating -- one of those audiobooks that's hard to quit. Page for page, there were probably more 'Oh my gosh, she's not really going to....' moments in this book than most others, which sort of requires you to see what she DOES do, before pulling out the earbuds. As you might assume in fiction like this, every single decision she makes is incredibly stupid, except for the last -- but then, if the protagonist had been doing wise things, there wouldn't have been a book, so it's a hazard of the genre.

What I kept noticing all the way through was how much like a Jodi Picault novel this was -- the only thing missing was some little angel or spririt, somewhere, off to the side, pulling strings and implanting ideas. Lacking that little angel, this was much better than anything Picault has written, although the in-depth character analysis of each of the players, not to mention Reba the dog, got a wee bit tedious.

Even so, it was a worthy listen. I recommend it.

Very interesting concept, a serial kidnapper, rapist and murderer of young women-lets one girl live and not the others. That is the heart of the novel. It is a compelling story with complex characters, however I felt my own predictions were more exciting than how Ms. Lippman actually achieved closure. There was a lot of build up to the resolution however I felt a bit cheated at the end. This is my first Lippman tome and I am looking forward to reading another one. I hope the next will leave me a bit more satiated.

First, the story didn't have that initial 'hook' that generally makes me want to turn the page. But once Eliza received the letter from Walter, I thought, 'Okay, slow start, but here it is'. Wrong. Her reaction to the letter was not believable AT ALL. She is almost complacent in her reactions, aside from being unlikeable. There was so much meaningless narrative throughout the book that I ended up surfing pages to find something of interest. Why on God's earth you'd pick up any type of relationship with a man who kidnapped/raped you is beyond me. If it was closure she needed, her first reply to his letter should have been enough. But to keep the contact ongoing... unbelievable. This book was a disappointment, to the extent that I doubt I would read another by this author.

One reviewer complained about the hollowness of the book, another couldn't identify with the placidity of the protagonist. I agree there is a hollowness in the story and that hollowness is the placid protagonist, Elizabeth/Eliza. She takes up less space than most protagonists. I saw this as the author's design and not a flaw.

I enjoyed this book. The characters are not like me and I enjoyed getting to know them and their multifaceted POVs.

It is well-paced for my taste. I had the luxury of picking it up and reading it through to the end. I reread the ending again a few days later. I am sure someday I will read it again.

As a teenager, Elizabeth was kidnaped by a man who was later convicted of killing another young woman and sent to death row. Years later, with a new name, a life as a wife and mother, and no desire to have any connection to the man she spent the strange and still unexplainable time with, "Eliza" receives a letter through an intermediary, attempting to initiate communication, and setting in motion an emotional and potentially far-reaching chain of events.

This psychological thriller has a lot of interesting elements, and the author builds in some interesting detail, although there were moments it seemed a little unnecessarily layered, like the need to mention the level of difficulty each character had navigating between British and American phrases when the family returned from a stay in England. A little overwritten at times, and the ending resolved a little quickly once it was revealed (for my taste), but a generally satisfying read.

I teetered between three and four stars on this one, but the main character was so passive and easily manipulated, that I couldn't connect with her. Plus, the pathology of the killer seemed shallow. I like to know why someone does what he did. He didn't seem fully formed as a villain. I wanted to, but I couldn't take the leap to four stars because of what I perceived to be flaws I couldn't ignore. I've read and enjoyed other books by Ms. Lippman. This one was a bit disappointing. I would still read her again.

2 words that describe the book'Psychological gamesmanship

3 settings or characters I met

* In and around Maryland and Virginia, modern day and 1985

* Eliza Benedict has gone to great lengths to distance herself from her past identity as Elizabeth Lerner. Only a few people in the world know what happened to Eliza during the summer she was 15, and Eliza has done everything she can to keep it that way. So when a letter arrives one day from the man who abducted her that summer saying that he saw her photo in a magazine and that he'd know her anywhere, Eliza is rocked to her core. Desperate to keep this man in her past and prevent her children from knowing what happened to her, Eliza tries to "play nice" to keep the past in the past. However, the letter writer has an agenda of his own.

* Walter Bowman has been on death row longer than any other man in Virginia. As his execution day looms, he reaches out to Eliza in an attempt to convince her that he is not the same man as the one who abducted her and murdered another girl--he says he's changed and remorseful. Using a woman who advocates for the rights of death row inmates as his go-between with Eliza, Walter begins a carefully choreographed dance to bring Eliza back into his world and back to the days that they spent together back in 1985.

4 things I liked or disliked about the book:

* I liked how Lippman developed the relationship between Eliza and Walter. The book alternates between the modern day and the events of 1985, and we slowly get a glimpse of the complicated relationship that develops between Eliza and Walter. It is a relationship that few understand, including Eliza herself. I doubt that either Walter or Eliza understand exactly how they feel about each other. I thought Lippman did a good job of making Walter sympathetic enough that you can understand how their relationship evolved the way it did.

* I like how Lippman used the secondary characters in the book. Although the story is primarily told from Walter and Eliza's point of view, Lippman also includes two other characters: Barbara LaFortuny (a prisoner's advocate convinced that Walter is a changed man and doesn't deserve to die) and Trudy Tackett (the mother of Holly Tackett, the girl Walter was convicted of murdering). Both Barbara and Trudy are angry at Eliza for different reasons, and their anger acts as a catalyst that forces Eliza to go back and revisit those days she swore to leave behind. Both Barbara and Trudy have their own distinct voices, and you can see how their strong personalities are a contrast to Eliza's most passive approach to life.

* I liked how Lippman developed the characters of Eliza's children, Albie and Iso. They rang true to me (especially Iso's moody descent into being a teenager), and I appreciated that Lippman took the time to write about Eliza's challenges as a mother throughout the book. It helped make the book feel more "lived in."

* This was the first time I listened to a "professional" audiobook production. (Previously, I'd listened to amateur readers from LibriVox. Don't get me wrong ... I think it is great what LibriVox is doing, but the results can be a little uneven.) It made a huge difference, and I now see why so many of you are audiobook fans. The book was read by Linda Edmond, and I thought she did a terrific job. For a female narrator, I thought she did a good job creating a voice for Walter, and her Iso voice was pitch-perfect. I found her reading "easy on the ears," and she did a good job of making the nuances of various phrases come alive. In fact, I would say that listening to this book may have actually elevated it in my eyes more so than if I had read it in "real" book form. I'm now curious to try more audiobooks and am considering a membership in Audible.

5 stars or less for my rating

I'm giving the book 4 stars. This was the second Lippman book I read this year, and I think I preferred this to What The Dead Know. The relationship between Walter and Eliza was compelling, and it made me want to know what happened between them then and now. If you enjoy psychological suspense, I think this would be a good read. Lippman raises some interesting ideas during the course of the book, and it always kept my attention (which audiobooks in the past have not been able to do).

After much hype and many stellar reviews, I found this book to be very disappointing, and at times, even dull. The main character, Elizabeth/Eliza is boring and unlikeable, and her actions seemed unrealistic - not in an intentional, character driven, mysterious way, but in a "you must be kidding me" way. Having never been kidnapped, I can't say for sure, but her nonchalant reaction at being contacted by her former kidnapper seemed ludicrous. There is a scene in which a third party delivers a note to Elizabeth/Eliza from Walter, her former rapist/kidnapper. Elizabeth/Eliza "forgets" to read it for several hours. Please. I was most disappointed by the ending. The author includes countless references to a big secret, a secret Elizabeth must come to terms with, a secret that might save Walter from the death penalty. The actual secret, when revealed, was so ho-hum, so pointless, such a letdown, as to make me want to toss the book across the room. For a gripping version of the woman held hostage story, skip this and read STILL MISSING instead.

What happens to the girl who lives through her kidnapping and the murder of other girls? What made her different? How does she put her life back together? How does her family cope? And what happens if she buries it all but the past comes back to try to reclaim her?

These are some of the questions Laura Lippman addresses in her new standalone novel, I'd Know You Anywhere. That these questions are addressed through the action of the story and by what the characters do shows what a strong book this is, even stronger and more subtle than her brilliant last standalone, Life Sentences.

Eliza Benedict has a perfectly beautiful life, glimpsed from the outside. She and her successful, always supportive husband have two wonderful children. She doesn't have to work. Yet from the first scene, Eliza is seen as semi-fretful, as worrying that it's not all perfect, that something might turn sour and go wrong.

Perhaps that's because something in her life went very, very wrong. As a bored teenager who wore Madonna-style clothes in the mid-80s, Elizabeth Lerner went walking to a nearby fast-food place against her parents' rules. Cutting through a state park, she came across a young man with a shovel.

That man, Walter Bowman, was burying his latest victim. He then kidnaps Elizabeth and eventually rapes her. She survives more than two months with him, driving from place to place, Walter doing odd jobs for cash and Elizabeth knowing that at any minute, he could kill her and then go for her family. Walter kidnaps a second girl, a blond beauty who has every gift Elizabeth lacks in looks and charisma. That girl dies and Elizabeth is rescued when a cop pulls Walter over.

More than 20 years later, Walter is running out of time on Death Row. Elizabeth changed her name to Eliza and hopes the world has forgotten her assailant. But he sends her a letter, that he has seen a recent photo of her and her husband in a magazine and that he would know her anywhere. Won't she please write back?

As Walter's execution date nears, the novel goes back and forth between the present and those days when Eliza was kidnapped Elizabeth. This structure serves its purpose well in letting the reader know just what happened back then, and how people who were not there can reasonably come up with their own scenarios. Those people include a death penalty opponent who has made Walter her cause, the parent of a murdered girl and a true crime writer who published a book about Walter's crimes. This structure allows the presence of these characters who were not there to make a strong impact on what happens in the present in a manner that creates extreme suspense.

Even while wondering what is going to happen to Eliza, to Walter, whether Eliza's children will learn about what happened to her and who will tell them, Lippman uses these characters and their situations to delve into many of the questions that accompany such a traumatic event. Over time, how did Elizabeth's kidnap, rape and rescue affect her? How did it affect her family? Can she, or any of her family, forgive Walter? What about other victims and their families? Eliza feels guilty for being the girl who got away, especially as she does not understand how this happened. When others want to accuse her of being Walter's willing lover or accomplice, her hurt is palpably greater than when she was first taken.

Looking at Walter Bowman's crimes through so many different perspectives makes what happened in Lippman's novel seem far more real than the sensational crimes publicized via cable TV and magazine checkout stands. Many types of hurt are acknowledged, but the author makes clear that just because some characters set up dichotomies regarding one hurt counting more than another, that is not true. Being hurt is being hurt. Grief is grief. And a victim is a victim, even if one survives. Because although Lippman is fairly even-handed in drawing the characters, she also makes certain that the focus remains on Eliza/Elizabeth.

Eliza's husband may be a wee bit too perfect, getting the climactic scene set up may take a bit of disbelief suspension, but these are quibbles compared to the way everything else works so well throughout the novel.

Every action a character takes makes perfect sense for that character at that particular time, which is an even more remarkable achievement when different scenarios are presented. Best of all, Lippman takes what could easily be lurid fare and makes it an honest search for answers. And every character is someone that you, too, could very well know anywhere.

I enjoyed this book but I struggled through it. It was hard to identify with the lead character but I think that was part of the point. Was she a meek person because of what happened to her, or was she alive because she was a meal person. I would read it again but I just felt like there could have been a bit more depth.

Laura Lippman is one of my favorite authors and I have read most of her books. This book, like her other "stand-alones" is different from the Tess Monaghan series. That is not a bad thing, but I think that those who are expecting Tess and one of her cases could be disappointed here.

Rather than a detective story, a who-dun-it, this is a well-written character-driven psychological novel, the plot of which has already been thoroughly outlined in other reviews. It really makes you think: what would I have done?, why was Elizabeth allowed to live?, has Walter really changed for the better?, what does he really want?, does it even matter?, does Elizabeth owe anything to other possible victims' families?, what really happened the night Holly was killed?, when, or is, the death penalty justified? Very thought-provoking and very serious questions indeed.

That said, I really did not enjoy the book and found it more depressing than something I wanted to read each night before falling asleep (unfortunately, that's when I do all of my reading, so please spare me the comments about my shallowness). I wanted to stick with it because I really wanted to see the conclusion, but at the same time I really wanted it to be over. For this reason, I have to say I like most of Lippman's other books better and offer this opinion in case there are others who read for "enjoyment" before going to sleep.