Rating: 
Summary: Stunning!
Review: This is a book i will remember for a long,long time.Having read other novels by Lehane i thought i knew roughly what to expect but this was something totally different-the shock ending left me feeling as if i had been physically hit!Read it!
Rating: 
Summary: Couldn't get into it
Review: Ok, I loved Mystic River, but this book? I got about a third of the way thru then just gave up. And the first (about) 50 pages - I have NO idea what in the world was going on! Then after that, they kept repeating themselves over and over again. She was barefoot, the windows were barred, they were on an island -- I get it! I use to NEVER give up on a book without trudging through - but these days, I'm starting to do just that more and more. I wish there could be a money-back guarantee - - I'm wasting so much money!
Rating:
Summary: What was that ending all about?
Review: I was very dissapointed in Shutter Island, my first Lehane novel. The writing style was interesting but the story was cliche after contrivance with confusion thrown in for good measure. And what was that ending? It lost me completely and made me feel that my time spent on the book was wasted. If it hadn't been a library book I would have left it on the plane. And I won't be reading another Lehane any time soon.
Rating: 
Summary: Plausible Ending?
Review: Since more than a few decriptions have been given, I'll forego that. I think Dennis Lehane is tops in his genre and love reading him. "Shutter Island" was a little disappointing in that I have trouble believing a psychiatric facility would go to such intricate lengths to bring a patient out of their psychosis. But then, this is fiction. Other than that, the read is great. As always, Lehane does not disappoint with his characterizations. He's a wonderful writer and one I will always read.
Rating: 
Summary: Did I Blink?
Review: Caution, SPOILERS. Please, please, please someone write and explain the ending to me. I truly did not get it (and I'm not usually dumb)!! If we are to believe the ending, how is everything else explained? How did he and Chuck get there in the first place? Was that "made up" too? I thought it was very intriguing until the end. I felt duped.
Rating:
Summary: Predictable, but lovely. (and a half.)
Review: Dan Brown, The DaVinci Code (Dubleday, 2003)
Dennis Lehane, Shutter Island (Morrow, 2003)
William M. Valtos, The Authenticator (Hampton Roads, 2000) Rarely, when I read, do three books come together so very well for one review. But such is the case here with The DaVinci Code, The Authenticator, and Shutter Island. Imagine, if you will, a kind of number line of style, with the very best writers at the rightmost extreme and the very worst at the left. On the right are those authors who pay great attention to detail, and while they may miss a continuity trick or two, they always have it together. Their prose is readable, though it may be difficult, but it is always impeccable from a grammatical standpoint. (We'll allow a number of spelling errors for editorial mishaps.) Their characters are always well-drawn, the plot when it exists is interesting, the theme never takes over the storyline and slaps you in the face. William Faulkner and Wendy Walker reside on the right end of the line. So does Kathe Koja. Margaret Laurence roved around, but fell close to it all the time, and hit it with The Diviners. Charles Reznikoff OWNED the right side of the line. On the left you have sloppy writing, loose ends, lectures in the middles of books, rampant grammatical errors and conscious misspellings (and, usually, a vehement defense of them), plots that disappear and reappear, glacial pacing, and all the rest of the things that make books unreadable mounds of tripe. So as not to step on any toes I'll let you fill in your own list here; I'm sure any reader has happened upon enough of these writers to fill at least a branch library. Now imagine it has a moving axis. Above the line are those authors who, simply, do their research. Below it are those who either don't research at all or do just enough research to give truth to the phrase "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing." Every author can be plotted on the resulting two-dimensional graph. Dennis Lehane sits somewhere in the right center. There's nothing necessarily factual about anything he writes in Shutter Island, save a seamless fifties-era feel and the geographic locations of certain islands off the coast of Massachusetts. Everything else springs fully-formed from the man's demented mind. And it is a true tribute to any author, I think, to be able to say 'this book was predictable, but I kept reading anyway." Yea, I had the plot twist figured out in the first hundred pages. But Dennis Lehane is such a wonderfully readable author that I couldn't have cared less whether I knew what was happening or not. (Warning, any fan of horror will probably get the ending as soon as, or sooner than, I did.) Lehane flirted with his plot twist, in fact it's rather odd that a person who normally writes mystery novels was so blatant with the clues to what was happening; the characters might as well have come out and said it a few times. Which leads me, of course, to the belief that it was all a conscious act. He was letting the reader in on the big joke, too. It's a beautiful thought. U. S. Marshals Teddy Daniels and Chuck Aule are on their way to the mental facility at Shutter Island in order to solve the classic locked-room mystery. A patient, Rachel Solando, has gone missing through a locked door and four manned checkpoints without a trace. Confounding the problem is Teddy's constant idea that folks aren't being completely forthcoming when he questions them. This is, quite simply, great noir. And in the tradition of great noir, you know there's going to be a denouement; no one, as it were, gets out of here alive. (No, that's not a spoiler, it's a figure of speech.) And if you've read any horror novels influenced by noir writers like Chandler and Thompson, you know just where this is going. Perhaps it's that safety that allows the reader to keep going, just as romance readers expect the guy to get the girl in the end. The main part of it, though, is Dennis Lehane's wonderful writing style, pure and simple. The man could keep the pages of the phone book turning. ...(continued in the review of The Authenticator)
Rating:
Summary: Dennis Lehane stretches his talent to something different
Review: In a change of pace for Dennis Lehane, his latest novel apparently asks the questions- "What is reality?" and "What is insanity?" After writing a successful series and then hitting it big time with MYSTIC RIVER- an elegiac work that might work as a coming of age novel, as well as, a murder mystery, SHUTTER ISLAND is unlike anything else he has written before. Initially it is a locked room mystery which becomes an island mystery then finally morphs into a suspense thriller with a surprise ending.
In the summer of 1954, US Marshall Teddy Daniels and his partner Chuck Aule are called to a psychiatric facility, Ashecliffe Hospital for the Criminally Insane located on a rugged New England island by the name of Shutter Island. They are to look into the disappearance of a female patient from a locked cell in the middle of the night. The escape appears impossible. As Teddy and Chuck look into the disappearance, they are given signals that they are themselves in danger. Teddy, however, has another ulterior motive. He wants to find and confront the pyromaniac responsible for his wife's recent death who is purported to be on the island.
SHUTTER ISLAND has met with mixed reviews. I wonder what readers would say if the author's name was not Dennis Lehane. Given that it is Dennis who wrote this book, I think the readers who complained simply expected more from him. The story is actually quite clever and is of the length that could be read in one long evening. It appears, with superficial reading, to lack the complexity and depth that one expects from Dennis. However, with more careful reading, that complexity and depth is still there. Once the conclusion is reached, the reader will get a sense of the careful construction that went into this work. The novel is a bit risky for Dennis as he continues to expand his army of core readers. However, he deserves credit for stretching himself into something very different and quite satisfying.
Rating:
Summary: Totally Gripping
Review: Shutter Island is a totally gripping read--you will not be able to put it down once you start it. As an indication--I read this novel in one day, and it was a work day. A word of advice to anyone reading this novel--try to make sure someone else you know has already read it. That way, when you come to the ending, there will be someone around for you to discuss it with. The novel begins as two detectives are headed towards an small island to investigate the mysterious disappearance of a convicted murderer at a psychiatric institute. The plot just takes off from there. After a couple of twists, you'll wonder just where this whole thing is headed. I had a couple of possible scenarios running through my head. There was one in particular where I thought "If this is where, he's going, I'll be so angry, it won't work." Well, that's Lehane went, but the astonishing thing he makes the ending work. It's ambiguous, for the most part, but that's why I recommend you know someone else who has read this novel before you crack it open. You will need to talk about it.
Rating:
Summary: End Was Expected but Still a Surprise
Review: Throughout this book, I suspected how it would end but kept telling myself surely Mr. Lehane wouldn't do that to his readers. But he did. And even though I expected it, it still caught me off guard and brought tears to my eyes. Lehane is the master at the complexities of the human persona. The book is full of twists and turns and hidden secrets behind the characters comments and faces.
Rating:
Summary: My First Lehane, Won't be the Last
Review: This is the first book by Dennise Lehane I've read and it certainly won't be the last. Since summaries have been given, I'll skip that part, but wanted to add that I found Lehane's writing to be excellent. He was very good at conveying the angst and regret US Marshal Teddy Daniels feels, the creepy personality of Dr. Cawley, and evoking a sense of agitation in the reader as the story builds. Very good story by an excellent author. I do hope it becomes the movie being discussed.
|
