Darkness, Take My Hand

Description

An electrifying thriller that is at once gut-wrenchingly violent and achingly melancholy. When wisecracking detectives Patrick Kenzie and Angie Gennaro agree to protect the son of a prominent psychiatrist who believes she may have angered the Boston Irish Mafia, they soon find bodies are piling up around them - seemingly unconnected with their case. And what's more all the clues point to an unlikely suspect - a serial killer who has been in prison for twenty years, so he can't be killing again, can he? As Angie and Patrick try to find out what kind of human being could perform such horrifying acts of rape, mutilation, torture and dismemberment, they discover that the killer's motive is disturbingly rooted in their own distant past. In a series of heart-stopping climaxes that grow ever more terrifying and bloody, the two work frantically with the Boston cops, the FBI, the local Mafia, and the folks from their old neighbourhood to unearth the killer before they become victims themselves.

Dennis Lehane was born and raised in Dorchester, Massachusetts. He has written seven novels, A DRINK BEFORE THE WAR, DARKNESS, TAKE MY HAND, SACRED, GONE BABY GONE, PRAYERS FOR RAIN, MYSTIC RIVER, SHUTTER ISLAND and a short story collection, CORONADO. MYSTIC RIVER was turned into an Oscar-nominated film, directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Sean Penn, Kevin Bacon and Tim Robbins. Before becoming a full-time writer, Mr Lehane worked as a counsellor with mentally handicapped and abused children, waited tables, parked cars, drove limos, worked in bookstores, and loaded tractor-trailers. His one regret is that no one ever gave him a chance to tend bar. He lives in the Boston area.

Lehane's hold is wholly unremitting and compelled me to read the novel in a single day * The Express * Dark and hypnotic * Guardian *