May 21, 2007 issue - Ex-reporter Laura Lippman may be known as a gritty crime novelist, but her Tess Monaghan series sends love notes to Baltimore's food, music and literature—an artsy side explained, perhaps, by her habit of rereading "Marjorie Morningstar" every year.
My Five Most Important Books
"Lolita" by Vladimir Nabokov. I began reading this at 12 because I had inferred that it was very dirty. I think I was 19 by the time I identified the dirty parts, and by then I no longer cared. My favorite novel, hands down.