3/21/2010 @ 12:00

3/21/2010

Postal code 12508, US
Beacon, NY 12508

We'll be doing something a little different for the cold, cold month of March, and then we'll be back to the regular format in time for April showers. Following up on the success of, "Shutter Island," our member Renee has made an excellent pair of suggestions: Brunch at Torches in Newburgh and Dennis Lehane's OTHER blockbuster, "Mystic River." It's such a great match of food and literature we couldn't say no. Here is a description of "Mystic River": Lehane ventures beyond his acclaimed private eye series with this emotionally wrenching crime drama about the effects of a savage killing on a tightly knit, blue-collar Boston neighborhood. Written with a sensitivity toward character that exceeds his previous efforts, the story tracks the friendship of three boys from a defining moment in their childhood, when 11-year-old Dave Boyle was abducted off the streets of East Buckingham and sexually molested by two men before managing to escape. Boyle, Jimmy Marcus and Sean Devine grow apart as the years pass, but a quarter century later they are thrust back together when Marcus's 19-year-old daughter, Katie, is murdered in a local park. Marcus, a reformed master thief turned family man, goes through a period of intense grief, followed by a thirst for revenge. Devine, now a homicide cop assigned to the murder, tries to control his old friend while working to make sense of the baffling case, which involves turning over the past as much as it does sifting through new evidence. In time, Devine begins to suspect Boyle, a man of many ghoulish secrets who has led a double life ever since the molestation. Lehane's story slams the reader with uncomfortable images, a beautifully rendered setting and an unnerving finale. So, see you all in February, and now you have TWO MONTHS to read "Mystic!"