Yeh dosti............. Review on Mystic River - Dennis Lehane

''There are threads in our lives. You pull one, and everything else gets affected'' This phrase written on the cover of Mystic River, is the first thing that attracts the reader to the book. Even before reading we can relate to this phrase with so many things that happen in our lives.

I have never read any of his earlier works but according the book Dennis Lehane has won the Shamus Award for Best First Novel for his book A Drink Before the War.

This book Mystic River - is full of powerful characters & a gripping plot ! The three main characters are all haunted by their past & the story tells us how this past affects all their present and future actions.

The books starts with 3 friends : Sean Devine, Jimmy Marcus and Dave Boyle. Sean & Jimmy are not so fond of the young Dave who they see as someone always tagging along with them. One day the three get into a fight & are stopped by a approaching police car. The policemen talk to all three of them and ask Dave to get into the car. Even though he doesn't want to Dave is forced to go along while Sean & Jimmy watch quietly. This is the incident which will change the lives of these 3 friends forever. The car & Dave disappear for four days and when he returns no one knows what the men inside the car did to him, but everyone suspects the worst. After his return, Dave is different in a way that destroys his friendship with both Jimmy & Sean.

Twenty five years have passed and the three friends come across each other again.

Jimmy is a ex-convict turned into a store owner but still with his mob connections. He is living comfortably with his 2nd wife and three daughters when tragedy strikes. His eldest daughter Katie is found murdered.

Sean is now a homicide detective. He is struggling with the failure of his marriage [wherein his wife becomes pregnant & leaves him] and recently his suspension has been lifted off so now he throws himself fully into the investigation of this new case - murder of Jimmy's daughter Katie.

Dave has a history of trouble. Nothing seems to be working in his favour - be it his work or his marriage. He is also into heavy drinking and always driving by the bars & parks. He is also the main suspect for Katie's murder - both by the book characters as well as by the reader. The night she was murdered Dave comes home covered in blood and tells his wife that he has killed a mugger. At first his wife Celeste, supports him but as she is also related to Jimmy [she is Jimmy's wife's cousin] & the only one aware of both the incidents which happened that night, she begins to suspect Dave.

The murder of Katie forces each of these three characters to go back to their past & while Sean attempts to use the law to return peace and order to the neighborhood, Jimmy goes ahead with his vengeance which he would regret in the end and Dave's wife Celeste, sleeps at night with a man she fears may very well be a monster - a monster who fathered her child and hides his true nature from everyone, possibly even himself. Meanwhile poor Dave goes through hell & he is the character with whom the reader sympathize even if at times he appears to be [and is referred to as] a monster.

Lehane's writing is smooth and is surely one of the best fiction writers I have read. He manages to keep each of his characters interesting that the story keeps its mystery till the end.

Though I did guess the actual murderers I was still surprised to read the end of the story :) Let me tell you that the end is not so happy but the book is worth reading once.