Darkness Take My Hand




I've read four of Dennis Lehane's books, I was impressed with the first three: Shutter Island, Mystic River, and A Drink Before the War. They were smart and witty, with none of the filler of, say, a Robert Crais, who really doesn't have anything to say or a story to tell, but writes anyway. Darkness, Take my Hand is by far the least impressive of the Lehane novels I have read so far, though it does not sink the depths of your latter Elvis Cole novels (Crais showed promise with The Monkey's Raincoat, but fell off sharply after that). As a novel it's hardly original, one of the 90's serial killer genre, it has Kenzie and Gennaro trying to catch a dismembering, stalking, really smart psycho who taunts them at every turn. It doesn't have the dark feel of Lehane's better work, it lacks the fresh wit of A Drink Before War, and the original everything of Shutter Island. That's not to say that it's a stupid book, it's smarter and rawer and more original than most, but he can do better. This book is for completists, the ones who have to read every book by a particular author.