Shutter Island - Softcover

Lehane, Dennis

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0061703257 ISBN 13: 9780061703256

Publisher: HarperCollins, 2009

Synopsis

U.S. Marshal Teddy Daniels and his partner, Chuck Aule, come to Shutter Island's Ashcliffe Hospital in search of an escaped mental patient, but Ashcliffe's sinister patient treatments propel them to the brink of insanity.

About this title

Review:

Shutter Island is something of a departure for Dennis Lehane. It is not like the private eye novels with which he made his name and it is not especially like Mystic River, his distinguished crime novel about murder, loyalty and revenge. Instead, he gives us a classic of psychological suspense--US Marshal Teddy is summoned to a remote hospital for the criminally insane to look for a missing patient and finds his own future and sanity on the line. It is the 1950s and experiments with drugs, conditioning and brain surgery are all the rage both in the psychiatric profession and in the shadow world of government agencies.

Teddy rapidly becomes aware that no-one he is talking to is remotely telling him the truth and that he cannot be wholly sure even of his charming new partner. As the island hospital is isolated by a hurricane, we find ourselves unable to trust a single thing that the narrative tells us--Lehane displays a gift for sleight of hand which is showily disorienting. At the same time, this is not just a box of tricks. We find ourselves caring deeply for Teddy and his partner Chuck, whatever is going on and whoever they really are.--Roz Kaveney

Review:

"Chilling, thrilling and so clever you'll be chewing it over long after the final page" (Mirror)

"A psychological tour de force. Absolutely nothing is as it seems in this effortlessly complex thriller" (The Times Literary Supplement)

"Lehane's new novel carries an ending so shocking... that it will go down as one of the most aesthetically right resolutions ever written... A tour de force" (Publishers Weekly)

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 0061703257
• ISBN 13: 9780061703256
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 385