REVIEW: ‘Mystic River’ by Dennis Lehane

Mystic River (2003) by Den­nis Lehane is set in the author’s home­town of Boston. It is a poignant and emo­tion­ally mov­ing story that clev­erly dis­guises itself as a police procedural.

In fact, the story is told in third per­son and seems to be more of a char­ac­ter dri­ven crime novel. One of the best I’ve read.

The story intro­duces the friend­ship of three boys who grew up together in the mid-1970’s. The three boys will even­tu­ally grow up to take dif­fer­ent paths in life only to find them­selves reunited again under dif­fer­ent circumstances.

The three boys are: Dave Boyle, the kid with the sad eyes and hope­ful grin who is now mar­ried with one son. Jimmy Mar­cus, the wild kid, full of energy who would grow up to be a con­vict, serv­ing two years in prison before going straight. Then there is Sean Devine, the laid back kid, who came from a blue-collar fam­ily who is now a cop, mar­ried to his work and sep­a­rated from his wife.

The story takes us back twenty-five years ago, to a moment in time, when a car dri­ves up on Gan­non Street and Dave Boyle gets in. This sin­gle event changes his life for­ever. Dave still lives in the same neigh­bor­hood where the peo­ple he grew up with knew what had hap­pened to him. He was known as the boy who was abducted and sex­u­ally abused. He was some­one to be pitied and shunned.

After Dave’s abduc­tion and return, the friend­ship with the other two boys irrev­o­ca­bly ends and the kids drift apart. The past yields to the present and the men who were once friends long ago find them­selves drawn back together again under less than ideal circumstances.

Mys­tic River is not an easy read nor did I expect it to be. Lehane’s razor sharp char­ac­ter­i­za­tions is one of the main rea­sons why I enjoy his work. His sto­ries are almost always grip­ping and intense when he decides to explore the pathos of human immorality.

As for Dave Boyle, he truly is a sym­pa­thetic char­ac­ter. A guy who is described as hand­some with sad eyes; some­one peo­ple felt the need to pro­tect. Since get­ting in that car twenty-five years ago, Dave is still haunted by the past and still bat­tling his demons. He is angered that his child­hood was snatched from him. From the way the story ended, one won­ders if he could have sal­vaged his life somehow.

Jimmy Mar­cus is a com­plex char­ac­ter. He’s a for­mer thief who now owns and oper­ates the cor­ner store in the neigh­bor­hood he grew up in. I was moved by how much Jimmy loved his daugh­ter, Katie. In that he decided to go straight to pro­vide her with a sta­ble life after her mother dies while he is in prison. It was just the two of them before Jimmy remar­ried and had two more chil­dren. Katie’s death broke some­thing in Jimmy and his grief was a pal­pa­ble thing.

I was think­ing about Mys­tic River, the title of this story and why it was so named and it seems sym­bolic to me in that it was a river pol­luted by human waste in regards to pol­lut­ing the human spirit.

My favorite char­ac­ter was Sean Divine. He is the State Trooper who inves­ti­gates the death of Jimmy’s daugh­ter, Katie Mar­cus. Sean is another inter­est­ing char­ac­ter. He is jaded and numbed by the evil­ness of soci­ety. Con­stantly faced with human weak­ness and dis­ap­point­ment, he let his feel­ings about his job spill into his mar­riage. As a result, Sean’s estranged wife calls him from time to time, from a ran­dom pay phone but she doesn’t say a word.

Mys­tic River is a solidly writ­ten story. I liked how the mys­tery unfolded and how the pieces slowly came together. I like sto­ries that engage you emo­tion­ally and on a level where your heart starts to race every time the author tight­ens up the ten­sion. Or you find your­self about to cry over a char­ac­ters fate or you find your­self deeply moved by the grief and chaos sur­round­ing these people’s lives. With Mys­tic River, you become deeply involved and heav­ily invested in the story.

I’m glad I got to read Mys­tic River hav­ing avoided the movie for that very rea­son. I thought Mys­tic River was cap­ti­vat­ing as usual but the overly depress­ing tone may be too much for some read­ers to take. Mys­tic River will be a story that I will reflect upon and think about from time to time. It was an engross­ing story from the start and by a tal­ented writer who con­tin­ues to amaze me. My grade, A.

This book as many of you are already aware is adapted into film of the same name and was directed by Clilnt East­wood, that starred Sean Penn, Tim Rob­bins and Kevin Bacon. Actors whose faces I imag­ined while read­ing this story. The movie received a lot of crit­i­cal acclaim and awards. Mys­tic River is avail­able in ebook and paper­back at your favorite bookstore.

Make sure to look out for Den­nis Lehane’s next book that’s due out Sep­tem­ber 23 and it is a his­tor­i­cal epic titled, The Given Day. The film rights have already been optioned.

For Fur­ther Reading

• REVIEW: ‘Frac­tured’ by Karin Slaughter
• REVIEW: Shut­ter Island by Den­nis Lehane
• REVIEW: The Edge of Jus­tice by Clin­ton McKinzie
• The Lit­tle Death, P.J. Parrish
• The Girl With the Dragon Tat­too, Stieg Lars­son [Mil­len­nium Trilogy]
• The Devil’s Star, Jo Nesbø (Harry Hole Series)
• ‘The Ghosts of Belfast,’ Stu­art Neville
• Ken Bruen, “The Drama­tist,” Jack Tay­lor No.4
• Christa Faust, “Money Shot”
• Den­nis Lehane to Pen Sequel to ‘Gone Baby Gone’

Tagged as: Boston, Crime Fiction, Dennis Lehane, Mystery, Police Procedural