Dennis Lehane was born and raised in Dorchester, Massachusetts. He has written seven novels, A DRINK BEFORE THE WAR, DARKNESS, TAKE MY HAND, SACRED, GONE BABY GONE, PRAYERS FOR RAIN, MYSTIC RIVER, SHUTTER ISLAND and a short story collection, CORONADO. MYSTIC RIVER was turned into an Oscar-nominated film, directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Sean Penn, Kevin Bacon and Tim Robbins. Before becoming a full-time writer, Mr Lehane worked as a counsellor with mentally handicapped and abused children, waited tables, parked cars, drove limos, worked in bookstores, and loaded tractor-trailers. His one regret is that no one ever gave him a chance to tend bar. He lives in the Boston area.
[A] stellar effort...The punishing pace and internal plot logic perform in perfect tandem...Lehane proves he belongs in the big leagues with another gritty and surpassingly entertaining mystery * Publishers Weekly * [Dennis Lehane] turns the hard-boiled detective novel into an elegiac treatise on the corruption of the soul. With the wonderfully written Sacred, he shows that he gets better each time out -- Michael Connelly With its tight dialogue, explosive action scenes and heart wrenching emotional crises, Sacred is difficult to put down * The Times *