Mystic River
When they were children, Sean Devine, Jimmy Marcus, and Dave Boyle were friends. But then a strange car pulled up to their street. One boy got into the car, two did not, and something terrible happened -- something that ended their friendship and changed all three boys forever. Twenty-five years later, Sean is a homicide detective. Jimmy is an ex-con who owns a corner store. And Dave is trying to hold his marriage together and keep his demons at bay -- demons that urge him to do terrible things. When Jimmy's daughter is found murdered, Sean is assigned to the case. His investigation brings him into conflict with Jimmy, who finds his old criminal impulses tempt him to solve the crime with brutal justice. And then there is Dave, who came home the night Jimmy's daughter died covered in someone else's blood. A tense and unnerving psychological thriller, Mystic River is also an epic novel of love and loyalty, faith and family, in which people irrevocably marked by the past find themselves on a collision course with the darkest truths of their own hidden selves.
Themes & atmosphere
What you might want to know about Mystic River
The questions readers send us most often, answered without spoilers.
When they were eleven, three Boston boys made a wrong choice on a sidewalk, and one of them got into a strange car. Twenty-five years later, one is a cop, one is an ex-con, and one of their daughters has been murdered.
Yes. Clint Eastwood directed a 2003 film adaptation starring Sean Penn, Tim Robbins, and Kevin Bacon. Both Penn and Robbins won Academy Awards for their performances. The film is widely considered one of the best literary thrillers of the 2000s.
No. Mystic River is a standalone Dennis Lehane novel. Lehane has written ongoing series (Kenzie and Gennaro, Joe Coughlin) but Mystic River is independent.
Mystic River was written by Dennis Lehane, published in 2001 by HarperCollins.
Mystic River is 493 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, Mystic River takes most readers 7 to 11 hours to finish.
Mystic River is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.