Has anyone here read much Dennis Lehane? I am kind of on-the-fence on him. I have only read two books by him so far: Shutter Island and Gone, Baby, Gone, so I realize I don't have a lot to assess.

I had never heard of him before the movie "Shutter Island" came out. I saw the movie in the theatre, and thought it was pretty good. Not mind-blowingly awesome, but I liked the atmosphere of the film, and I thought they did a good job with the creepy, old orchestral score. I did feel that the twist ending was a little cliché and unbelievable, but it was kind of fun. So I picked up the paperback and read it. It was okay... kind of easily-digestable, light reading, the kind of thing you read on a flight. (And I did read it on a flight, as a matter-of-fact.)

I have never seen the movie of Gone, Baby, Gone, but I picked up the book and read it recently. I found it to be very readable and again, while it didn't blow me away, I still thoroughly enjoyed it and thought it was far better than Shutter Island. His main characters, two private investigators named Patrick Kenzie and Angie Gennaro, were intriguing and made me want to read more of their exploits. (Gone, Baby, Gone is apparently the third book in their saga.) It wasn't perfect: sometimes the dialogue was grating (he has his characters respond with "what?" far too often at times) and he sometimes uses his characters to voice his own opinions about stuff (in one part of the book one of his characters spends the better part of two pages discussing why the band The Smiths sucks so bad.)

I have since come to find out that he wrote "Mystic River" which I saw a long time ago but never considered who the creator was. I might pick that one up next... I remember the movie being pretty good.

Anybody else here a fan? A hater?