A wonderful, engaging, and thrilling book of short stories that all have delightful twists in their endings and center around a cast of women you definitely shouldn't take for granted. I'd never read a Tess Monoghan novel before reading this, which I thought would hurt me as two of the stories center around Tess, but my lack of knowledge didn't detract from the enjoyment; if anything, it has reminded me of how much I want to start reading the Monoghan PI mystery series. ( )

I registered a book at BookCrossing.com!
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/12548977

The stories in this collection all draw a lot of their vitality from their nicely constructed protagonists, none of whom are completely innocent and many of whom are quite despicable. The author has a knack of devising endings which ought to feel more far-fetched than they do, in the best tradition of the mystery. I hadn't read anything else by this author but plan to look for her novels some time in the future. ( )

It was a fast-paced reading. The book comprised 17 short stories, whereupon two are related to each other. Each story is gripping from the start up to the very last full stop. They make so addictive that one isn't able to stop reading. In each story women get the upper hand and there is a also a strong devilish thinking. It was an enjoyable reading and I can strongly recommend this book. ( )

This short story collection could have been subtitled “Women Who Kill”, because that is essentially what most of the stories revolve around. It’s a very strong collection, with only a few duds. Strangely, one of those duds was a Tess Monaghan story (Lippman’s most well-known character).

It’s difficult to narrow down exactly which stories were my favorites. The first story, The Crack Cocaine Diet, is fabulous just for its voice. I really enjoyed The Accidental Detective, a newspaper-style piece on Tess Monaghan that gives nice insight into the character, even if you haven’t read any books in that series. Easy as A-B-C was also quite entertaining — one of the few in the collection from a male point of view. And I thought the novella, Scratch a Woman, was very good.

Lippman is an excellent weaver of stories. Even when you think you know where a story is going, she can surprise you. If you enjoy crime fiction or short story collections, I think this is a must-read. ( )