Patrick Kenzie and Angela Gennaro's client is a prominent Boston psychiatrist, running scared from the vengeance of the Irish mob. But something even more frightening is lurking in the shadows. Death himself ears down on them now'reaching out with cold, bloodstained fingers from twenty years in the past to shake their world with a spree of violent, horrific murders that bear an unmistakable signature: that of a long-imprisoned psychopath . . .

Dennis Lehane has earned his reputation as the boldest new voice in detective fiction with stunning, explosive novels featuring Kenzie and Gennaro, private investigators who come from a hard place'the rough, blue-collar streets of Dorchester'and never left it. Now the darkness that lives in the hearts of the angry and disaffected has reached their doorstep. Suddenly, the truth may be too personal, to costly, too terrible to pursue.

Get ready for an unpredictable journey through the mean streets of the city and of the mind, from the most exciting young writer in mystery literature.He came during the warmest, most erratic autumn on record, when the weather seemed to have flipped completely off its usual course, when everything seemed upside down, as if you'd look at a hole in the ground and see stars and constellations floating at the bottom, turn your head to the sky and see dirt and trees hanging suspended. As if he had his fingers on the globe, and he slapped it, and the world--or at least my portion of it--spun.

Patrick Kenzie and Angela Gennaro's latest client is a prominent Boston psychiatrist running scared from a vengeful Irish mob. The private investigators know something about cold-blooded retribution. Born and bred on the mean streets of blue-collar Dorchester, they've seen the darkness that lives in the hearts of the unfortunate. But an evil for which even they are unprepared is about to strike as secrets long-dormant erupt, setting off a chain of violent murders that will stain everything—including the truth.

Mystic River was a finalist for the PEN/Winship Award and won both the Anthony Award and the Barry Award for Best Novel as well as the Massachusetts Book Award in Fiction given by the Massachusetts Center for the Book.

Before becoming a full-time writer, Mr. Lehane worked as a counselor 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.