A poor quality read in comparison to his other works and the other Kenzie and Gennaro books. ( )

This one made me laugh out loud. More than once. In a good way. Yeah, it’s a detective novel and there are preposterous things in it – like the perfect understandings between strangers and hairsbreadth escapes, but that’s what it’s supposed to be. Angie and Patrick are a team and share responsibility for casework, bloodshed and screw-ups. It’s nice to see.

Of course Desiree is not what she seems. Neither is Trevor. The old man wants her dead, not found. Because she tried to kill him. She killed her mother in the faked car-jacking instead. In the end, they are left tied by the ankles to chairs in a huge room in Trevor’s mansion where the first to put their fieldstripped semi-automatic together, gets to shoot the other. Pretty funny. They both get a shot home and are found dead.

I am surprised that Jay was killed off. I didn’t expect that. I think he would have been useful in later books. The detective firm that he worked for was destroyed (and one of the partners killed) by Trevor and so there would have been no business’ covenant to break if Jay went into the business on his own. Oh well. Patrick has other buddies who can come to his rescue. Like Bubba and his acetylene torch. Now THAT was a funny scene. ( )

Another not-so-great page-turner from Lehane. He is very readable -- I finished the book in two days -- but he employs a degree of melodrama that's distasteful. His characters and the situations are cinematic in the negative sense. This would be fine in a genre less anchored to realism, but in a gritty crime novel, its a flaw that becomes fatal.

That said, it's a fine book for a plane or a beach. And I completely endorse his rant against modern architecture.
6.6.09 ( )

I really enjoyed this. It's fast-paced, with good dialogue & interesting characters, even the baddies. I had trouble putting it down and I'm looking forward to reading more of Patrick Kenzie & Angela Gennaro. ( )

I must say that 'Sacred' has been the best one of the Kenzie/Gennaro books so far. Lehane keeps you guess on exactly who the bad guys are in the book. Is it the grief center with the bouncer-like counselors; the church official who stole $2 million from a new age church; then there's Patrick's mentor who has disappeared while looking for a rich socialite; but then there's her father? There is never a dull moment in this book and it's a race to finish it just to discover actual is the bad guy. Read it for yourself to see... you won't be disappointed. ( )