Rating: 
Summary: Good build, but ok finish
Review: Some folks have written about the (allegedly) earth shattering conclusion, but I felt the first half of the book was better than the second. The very first chapter, in my opinion, basically ruins ending (in that it isn't coherent/consistent with it, in my opinion). I very much like how the story was built. Also enjoy the concise language and tension. It's a good read.
Rating: 
Summary: Unrelenting suspense..unbridled fear..expect this and more
Review: from Lehane's long-awaited latest novel. The story line carries us along at break-neck speed, even to the point of careening out of control; and making this a 'white-water' ride that will remain in the reader's memory a long, long time. The setting is a fog-shrouded island on which is housed an insane asylum. The doctors, if they are indeed doctors, shed an eerie light on the goings-on and the warden with his pasty-white face and questionable demeanor; far from put the reader at ease. We come to the island with Teddy Daniels and his partner Chuck Aule, U.S. Marshalls who have been called on assignment to find an escaped inmate. However, in their investigation they discover she has escaped from a locked room and somehow gotten past numerous hospital employees and card-playing attendants all of whom would have blocked her escape route. Ted is actually thrilled to be here at Shutter Island, as dreary and dreadful as the surroundings are because he has learned that his wife's killer has been moved to the Shutter Island asylum from another facility. No matter what he tells others; his intent is to kill him when he finds him...and he does all in his power to do just that. Find the inmate and return her to her cell....find the murderer of his wife and kill him. This novel is a well constructed maze. The reader's mind becomes entangled and ensnared in the lives and emotions of the Marshall Daniels and of his partner Chuck. We are tossed and turned like a bottle on the sea trying to sight landfall. When we finally land..exhausted, confused, but exhilarated by the inexplicable challenges we have been thru with this gallant duo.....well...the landing is a hard one. It is unexpected...it is breathtaking...it is startling...it is spectacular!!!One reviewer said if he had just read it slower he would have known the conclusion. There are two things wrong with that statement. First....you cannot read this insightful work at a slow pace...you are pushed along and have no control. Secondly, unless you took up residence in Lehane's head at the time it was written there is no way to 'figure it out'...just no way anyone could know to what end all this will lead! And that is what makes Lehane a genius at what he does and does so very well. A Gold Medal and a laurel wreath to Dennis from a fan who appreciates his thought processes and revels in his expertise!!!!
Rating: 
Summary: ridiculous!
Review: Another ridiculous story by an over-rated writer. The audio version is read by David Strathairn who swallows one third of every sentence, so be prepared to turn your volume on HIGH. Who is friend in this story, who is foe? Who cares!!!
Rating: 
Summary: Are the inmates running the asylum?
Review: Dennis Lehane's psycho thriller Shutter Island is set in the 1950's around the Boston area. U.S. Marshal Teddy Daniels, a tough hard boiled WWII veteran is ordered to Shutter Island along with his new partner Chuck Aule to investigate the disappearance of an inmate of the Ashecliffe Hospital which located on the island. Ashecliffe is a mental facility for the criminally insane. Daniels soon learns that the patient, Rachel Solando, a triple child murderess has inexplicably vanished without a trace. The hospital staff lead by a brilliant but mysterious Dr. Cawley is less than helpful in aiding the marshals. As a hurricane bears down on the island stranding Daniels and Aule, the marshals make some startling discoveries. They suspect that Ashecliffe is secretly being used for both surgical and pharmacologic experimentation on the inmates. Daniels, who was an intelligence agent in the war, finds and deciphers clues apparently left behind by Solando to unravel the mysteries of Shutter Island. Lehane's novel progresses along fluidly until it makes an abrupt and somewhat clumsy twist into a "I can't believe he ended it like this" conclusion.
Rating:
Summary: this one will grab you
Review: I enjoyed Shutter Island because it provides suspense in a quick pace without a lot of unnecessary junk. There's enough in the book to keep you guessing but not so much that you begin to fall out of where Dehane has taken you. Mental illness, dealing with grief, dealing with war and violence, Cold War paranoia, and government treachery have all been written about before. But Dehane mixes these nicely in an engaging tale with a very engaging main character, a US marshal sent to find a missing patient on an island fortress which houses a hospital/prison for the criminally insane.
Rating:
Summary: Agatha Christie meets Cuckoos Nest
Review: The thing about Dennis Lehane is that he had it made. Those two guys, Patrick and Angie, were fighting crime, falling in love, falling out of love, fighting crime, and it could have gone on forever (as many of the "format" authors do). But what separates Lehane from the rest of the pack is his unwillingness to settle for the easy way. He wrote "Mystic River," which distanced himself from many, and now follows that up with "Shutter Island." Shutter Island . . . . imagine a mystery set in the venue of Ken Kesey's Cuckoo's Nest? What is real and what is memorex? Who is lying, who isn't? When U.S. Marshal Teddy Daniels goes out to Shutter Island off of Boston Harbor to investigate the disappearance of a patient, Rachel Soldano, we're just not sure what we're in for. Both him and his partner, Chuck Aule, are there to resolve the Rachel Soldano case. But reluctantly, the close mouthed Teddy acknowledges that there is another issue. There's a man incarcerated (treated?) there that was an arsonist and set fire to Teddy's apartment, killing his wife. He's lived with the hatred, remorse, despair, rage and sadness for several years. What he plans to do is never resolved in his partner's mind. But murdering him isn't out of the question. When things add up and then don't add up, the reader is hanging together with Lehane but not sure we know where he's taking us. That's an infrequent pleasure, a brilliant novelist getting us to the last 20 pages with NO idea of what's going to happen. The ending will knock your socks off.
Rating:
Summary: Could've been great.....
Review: "Shutter Island" was a lot of fun - until I could see where it was going about 2/3's through...and even then I thought that Lehane was going to pull a final-final twist, something fantastic to reward the reader. But no!!! Extremely unsatisfactory ending. I suppose some readers may think it's "brilliant" or "mind-blowing" but to others like me it was one big "Oh brother...". Hey Dennis - how about putting 2 endings onto the paperback version? The mediocre one you already wrote, and then a brilliant double-flip-flop that we fans know you're capable of!!! C'mon, you can do it!
Rating:
Summary: Best "Locked Room" Mystery I Have Read
Review: I ususally do not write reviews, not because I do not like the books I read, but because I don't like to give a lot away, as
I have seen some do.
BUT........for those of you who like the old "locked room" mysteries, this is the best.
Rating:
Summary: Just read the book!
Review: i don't know where to start. I am a faithful Lehane devotee and i must admit that this book was such a stretch for him as a writer that it would have been either a total disaster or a work of genius. I am glad to announce that it was definately the latter!! What an ending! I can't really say that i got it completely but Lehane certainly managed to keep me up all night wondering how he managed to fool me so easily! I can't recommend this book highly enough!
Rating:
Summary: Go For A Ride!!
Review: Take a little trip this summer across Boston Harbor to Ashecliffe Hospital. It's a trip you will find very difficult to forget. An absolutely stunning (and quite unpredictable) ending will leave you reeling.
| 
