Sunburn audiobook

4.5 Stars!My reviews can also be found at: https://deesradreadsandreviews.wordpr...The cover of “ Sunburn ” caught my eye right away. And after reading the book description, I was really looking forward to getting my hands on this new novel from Laura Lippman.The novel opens in Belleville, Delaware in 1995.When Polly and Adam meet at the High-Ho restaurant in Belleville, they’re both just passing through. Polly, a redhead with a two-day-old sunburn catches Adam’s eye. They aren't sure what to make of each other. It isn't love at first sight but there is a definite attraction.Polly has a past but she’s planning for a brighter future. She has no intention of changing those plans or letting anyone stand in her way. But sometimes people with the best intentions have the worst luck.It’s not long before Adam and Polly are completely wrapped up in each other. Somehow these two strangers who are supposed to just be passing through end up staying in Belleville that summer.They both know it won’t last. It can’t last….could it?Although Adam knows some of Polly’s past he realizes there’s so much more that he doesn’t know.“ But no one knows her whole story. She plans to keep it that way” He’s been warned about Polly. He’s been told that she’s only out for herself.“ Whatever you do, don’t turn your back on her. Even face to face, you might not be safe with that one.” But Adam can’t reconcile these warnings with the woman he’s getting to know. But he does wonder where she goes on those days that she borrows his truck.Polly also wonders if she can trust Adam. Is it really just a coincidence that they ended up in the same small town, at the same time? Polly’s track record with men…well, it’s muddy, to say the least. But for some reason, she feels safe with Adam, like she can finally be herself. But her past continues to haunt her, and not everyone is happy for Polly and Adam.Though they both have some reservations, Polly and Adam start to make plans for the future. But then something happens that throws a wrench into those plans. Will what they have together survive what comes next?I really enjoyed this novel. It was a bit of a slow burn at first, but the pace picked up and it wasn’t long before I was caught up in the story. Polly and Adam were both very complex characters, with secrets that left me unsure of who I should trust. Polly especially intrigued me. I wanted to know the reasons for some of her actions.There were quite a few points of view, though the majority of the story was told from Polly and Adam’s perspective.“ Sunburn ” was an entertaining psychological suspense novel with an intriguing storyline that kept me flipping pages well past my bedtime. However, it was worth it as I loved how everything came together in an unexpected but extremely satisfying way. Thank you to William Morrow for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for my honest review.

Great book. Well paced. Beautifully observed details. Interesting characters and nuance in the right places. The overall mystery sustains itself well for quite a lot of the time. Thoroughly enjoyed this book and the protagonist who is flawed and brilliant and ruthless and unapologetic.

OOH, my review went up on L.A. review of books today!!https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/l...**************************************************super excited to be reading and reviewing this for l.a. review of books!!! review is scheduled for 3/5

4.5 stars, rounded upIf you enjoy ‘modern noir’ with deeply flawed characters, as I do, you will love Sunburn. What a terrific read! I recommend picking this book up without knowing a lot of details of the plot. (No spoilers in this review!) I listened to the entire book on a long car trip last Sunday and was riveted. It’s a slow burn in the beginning, but the tension and atmosphere kept me interested throughout. When Polly and Adam meet, they both have secrets. Polly is on the run from a complicated past. We are told from the start that she has left her husband and 3-year-old daughter. What kind of mother leaves her young child? Her past is much more complicated than it appears, and pieces of that past are slowly revealed to us. Meanwhile, Adam has his own secrets. We are told in the beginning that, unknown to Polly, he is a PI who was hired to find her, but we don’t know why or by whom. Neither knows the whole story about the other and they intend to keep it that way. Both are deeply flawed and you just know the attraction they feel for one another is ill-fated. I didn't know who to believe or trust and was kept guessing right up to the end. And what an ending it was! It was a surprising development that I had to sit and think about for a while. This is a slim book but in between its covers is quite a layered and complex tale. Highly recommended!

Dangerously seductive!!!....lustful puzzling steam ....compelling & alluring....unsympathetic characters....secrets, lies, love, betrayal, manipulation.......crime, murder, mystery....The ending wasn’t predictable to me ( perhaps part of it), surprisingly satisfying.I had mixed feelings for awhile with this book - but I kept returning - glad I didn’t give up ( a few slow parts)...but overall I definitely liked it enough to be interested in reading more books by Laura Lippman.

Two strangers meet at a small town bar. One is a sexy and mysterious redhead. The other is a handsome man who says he’s just passing through. That’s either the set-up to a dirty joke or the start of a noir novel. I’ve been meaning to read Laura Lippman for a while now, and this one was right up my alley. I don’t want to say too much about the story because I think it’s one of those that the less you know the better going in. Suffice it to say that there’s plenty of twists and turns with both the main characters, Polly and Adam, hiding their own secrets and spending a lot of time wondering if they can trust the other even as neither of them can resist the attraction they have. The plot is exceedingly clever with a James Cain feel to it, and that’s obviously deliberate since he’s even referenced. It’s one of those books where even the reader feels unsure of their footing as you’re constantly reevaluating each of them as new revelations come out. It’s also interesting that there’s actually very little action within the book. Most of what would be considered ‘the exciting parts’ happen before the book begins, and the biggest event that occurs essentially takes place between chapters. We don’t even know the truth about that until the end. In fact, a great deal of this just takes place in the heads of the people as they think about their secrets and suspicions even as they go about the routines they fall into over the course of the story.That’s where the character work shines, and Lippmann shows a real flair at walking the line of leaving a reader unsure of what to think of both of them. Is one the victim and one the villain? Are they both villains? Both victims? What’s great is that the more you learn the less sure you’ll be about making any judgments about either one of them.

This is a modern noir novel that pays homage to the great books of James M. Cain. Like The Postman Always Rings Twice or Double Indemnity, it focuses on two lovers, Polly and Adam, each of whom has closely held secrets that are revealed very slowly as the book progresses.The story takes place in Belleville, a small town in Delaware, forty-five miles from the beach, and where nearly everyone is simply passing through. As the book opens, a sunburned Polly is nursing a drink in the High-Ho, a bar/restaurant that, like most of the town, is down at the heels. Adam spots her and moves in slowly, but the connection is made, and the two of them will wind up staying in Belleville and working at the High-Ho, long after each of them had planned to be well down the road.As the summer progresses, someone will die, and the death will have critical implications for Adam and Polly and for their relationship. Other than that, I'm really reluctant to say anything more about the book. Lippman has constructed the plot very carefully, and peels back the curtain slowly and deliberately. To say more would reveal things that the reader should delight in discovering for him- or herself.Suffice it to say that I think this is Lippman's best book yet and one that actually stands the comparison to those of James M. Cain. Anyone who is a fan of those classic novels will not want to miss this one. One of my favorite reads of the summer thus far.

I enjoyed this original mystery. We know Polly is hiding things from her past when she meets Adam at a bar in a small town in Delaware. She intends to go West, he’s passing through. But against both of their better judgments, they fall for each other and stay where they are.They’re both hiding things from one another, things that are revealed to the reader and each other over the course of the book. Polly is an odd character, but I ultimately liked both her and Adam. There were clear villains in this story, some who weren’t even alive anymore.For more reviews: please visit: http://www.theresaalan.net/blog

Two men, more added on, one woman, many lies and a lot of deceit.SUNBURN has your brain burning to find out what is really going on.Polly has just left her husband, Gregg, and her daughter, Jani, while they were at the beach. She had it planned, but we don't know why.Gregg was ready to leave the marriage, but Polly took off first.Adam is also mysterious because we don't know what he is up to since he showed up at the same time Polly did and decided to hang around and work at the same place Polly found a job.The suspense continues non-stop as secrets come out and Polly keeps manipulating and planning. She has a secret she won’t tell and things she needs to take care of. Surprises continue to pop up, and the intrigue intensifies as Polly continues to secretly and mysteriously do what she does best.Wow...Ms. Lippman has outdone herself with this book.Absolutely loved it...the entire storyline and ending were great!!Ms. Lippman has written another psychological page turner which is going to be a favorite. SUNBURN is truly a masterpiece of suspense!! One of her best. 5/5This book was given to me free of charge and without compensation by the publisher, Bookperk, PageTurners, and Edelweiss in return for an honest review.

3.5/5 EstrellasMe voy a auto-entrevistar, a ver si me aclaro las ideas:¿Me ha gustado el libro? Si, podemos decir que notable alto.¿Puntos fuertes? El personaje central femenino está muy bien (estamos ante un femme noir), empieza fuerte, sorprendiéndonos, aunque poco a poco, a mi juicio, se va estereotipando y perdiendo un poco de empuje. El cierre no me ha parecido brillante y es bastante previsible. La relación, más sexual que afectiva con Adam, lejos de ser explícita y vulgar, transmite mucha fuerza y da empaque al libro.¿Qué me ha gustado menos? Poco a poco la trama se va a alargando, la relación no da más de si, las intenciones de Polly (nuestra femme), son cada vez más evidentes, entre polvos, comidas y el ambiente poco estimulante del pueblo donde transcurre la historia pierde brillantez y se aborrega. Que decir de Adam, nuestro personaje masculino principal, que al principio de todo se compara con Ken (el de Barbie), aunque peor hubiera sido que se comparase con Lorenzo Lamas el rey de las camas...en fin, luego mejora y su explosiva relación con Polly es bastante convincente.Que si lo recomiendas: Que si, no está mal el libro, no conocía a la autora, pero este personaje tan camaleónico que ha creado me ha gustado, así que le daré otra oportunidad a alguna de sus más de 20 novelas publicadas, que no es una novata no, que el ignorante soy yo.

Sunburn is a subtle and enigmatic piece of storytelling featuring a subtle and enigmatic main protagonist. A beautifully written joy to read.This is a slow burn, cleverly manipulative and genuinely compelling story, where the mystery elements play within the character studies, a story of two people hiding secrets and playing parts. It is utterly riveting as you follow Polly and Adam through a long summer of a relationship built on lies, neither of them are who they appear to be to each other and ultimately things will take a very dark turn..I loved this one because it wasn’t so much about the mystery elements at all, this is a tense and completely absorbing psychological drama, an understated yet captivating unraveling of motivation and personality. Polly is especially puzzling, not only to us the readers, but to Adam who is more drawn to her as time moves on…I love stories like this. You never really know where they are going to leave you – it isn’t about a twist or a sudden shock, it is about the vagaries of human nature and how we relate to each other, about the secrets we keep and how they define us. The end of Sunburn was beautifully done, leaving me with a satisfying feeling of melancholy, this was a novel I didn’t want to leave behind..Sophisticated, chilling, with a vivid sense of place and time I think it’s possible that Sunburn is my favourite novel from this author yet.Highly Recommended.

4.5/5Most of you know I’m an avid crime fiction reader, it’s my go to genre so I’m slightly ashamed to say this was my first Laura Lippman book! Looking through her back catalogue I can see she writes exactly the kind of books I love so I have NO idea how she’s been off my radar thus far. I’ve seen many others say that Sunburn is not typical for her, but I loved it and her writing is so nuanced, so dang good that I won’t be missing out on her books in the future.Polly is a mysterious woman with a plethora of secrets in her past, you know little about her for a long time, Lippman methodically peels back the layers of her character until you get to the core. Adam also has a mysterious past and the same goes for him, you slowly but surely gain information about his history and you’re just never totally comfortable trusting either of them. Unreliability at it’s best! There are quite a few points of view, but not too many in my opinion, each served a particular purpose and were there for a specific reason, not just as filler. The characters were complex, interesting and so shady, right up my alley.Many will say this is a slow burn and I totally agree, but it’s also a slow unraveling of a tangled tale that I was never quite sure of. Not sure of who to trust, not sure what their true motivations were and definitely not sure of what would happen next. I never did figure things out ahead of time, the ending totally surprised me, completely unexpected and wholly satisfying.Sunburn in three words: Subtle, Hypnotic and Unpredictable.

(NOTE: I've started blogging - you can join me here for more reviews and book discussions: https://macsbooks311.wordpress.com)Laura Lippman is one of my go-to authors for good crime fiction with a strong female lead. I assumed that was what I would be reading when I picked up her latest work, Sunburn. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Instead I was pleasantly surprised to find one of the best works of modern Noir with a classic touch that I have read in a long time. Lippman has created a femme fatale character that stands her ground with any of Chandler’s characters and then some!The book opens with two strangers in a bar – yep – a gorgeous woman with a sunburn and a handsome man who cannot stop watching her. You would think that this is a set up for an old classic movie but you soon find that the peeling layers of skin from Polly’s sunburn are metaphors for the multiple layers after layers of secrets, lies and deceits that these characters have brought to the table.Polly, a mother of two abandoned children – or is she? A murderess or battered wife protecting herself and her child… And who is Greg really? An admirer? Her savior or another pawn  who Polly is willing to use in her machinations of deceit?This is a hard-boiled classic noir tale of domestic intrigue that will have you rapidly turning pages to discover the truth – if you can. 5 golden stars and high recommendations for this incredible book.