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    Prayers for Rain
    Prayers for Rain
    Prayers for Rain
    Audiobook12 hours

    Prayers for Rain

    Written by Dennis Lehane

    Narrated by Jonathan Davis

    4.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    When a former client jumps naked from a Boston landmark, Private Investigator Patrick Kenzie wants to know why. Once a perky young woman in love with life, her suicide is the final fall in a spiral of self-destruction.

    What Kenzie discovers is a sadistic stalker who targeted the woman and methodically drove her to her death – a monster that the law can’t touch. But Kenzie can. He and his former partner, Angela Gennaro, will fight a mind-twisting battle against the psychopath, even as he turns tricks on them…

    Prayers for Rain is another superior thriller from Dennis Lehane, the bestselling and acclaimed author of Mystic River, Shutter Island, and Gone, Baby, Gone.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperAudio
    Release dateSep 13, 2011
    ISBN9780062101839
    Author

    Dennis Lehane

    Dennis Lehane is the author of thirteen novels—including the New York Times bestsellers Live by Night; Moonlight Mile; Gone, Baby, Gone; Mystic River; Shutter Island; and The Given Day—as well as Coronado, a collection of short stories and a play. He grew up in Boston, MA and now lives in California with his family.

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    Reviews for Prayers for Rain

    4.5/5

    95 ratings25 reviews

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    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 2/5
      in short it's a bit of an okay read - it is good to great in places however I found large chunks of it were a bit of a slog plus add to this there was a helluva lot of corn from the main, 2nd and 3rd characters. I Like the Author for his other great stand alone books, which is probably why I carried on reading this - had it been by somebody else an unknown to me then I would have binned it about a third of the way through.
    • 5/5
      I've always been a huge fan of Michael Connelly and when a friend recommended Dennis Lehane for me and said it was similar to Connelly I instantly picked up "Prayers for Rain".And what a superb book it was. Lehane writes some very good dialogue and some very intelligent and bare-bones descriptions of the action that is taking place.The first line in chapter 1 reads like this: "The first time I met Karen Nichols, she struck me as the kind of woman who ironed her socks."That is one hell of a opening line and you are instantly drawn into the world of private investigator Patrick Kenzin.
    • 4/5
      The fifth, and presumably last, Kenzie and Gennaro story, Prayers for Rain was right up there with the rest of the series. Lehane is violent and doesn't sugar-coat his heroes. Instead, they make mistakes, do questionable things, and suffer the consequences - physical and psychological. As is usual, Lehane's plotting is crisp and the characters are fantastic. But what really shines is his writing. It's lyrical and horrific at the same time. Fair warning, though. He doesn't pull any punches when describing the violence Patrick and Angela experience.Recommended, but for best effect, start with the beginning of the series.
    • 4/5
      More cartoonish than the last but I'll never tire of their banter.
    • 4/5
      I found the characters in this book terrifying, between the mafia, the charismatic psychopath and the sociopathic mastermind.
    • 4/5
      The book is fine. The performance in this series is great. I was very disappointed in this installment. Why is Devin's voice different in this book? It completely changes the character
    • 4/5
      This is my first Denis Lehane story and I am hooked. The suspense just keepsbuilding until you can't put it down.
    • 4/5
      The fifth, and apparently last, of Lehane's mysteries featuring Patrick Kenzie and Angela Gennaro. Angie broke away form Patrick, profesionally and personally, at the end of its predecessor, Gone, Baby, Gone, and Patrick begins this book hanging out with Bubba. Lehane doesn't make a big deal of it, but he does a nice job of showing Patrick having basically nowhere else to turn for camaraderie than to Bubba, the childhood friend whom we can almost read as representing Patrick's violent, messy side.Patrick helps Karen Nichols escape from a harasser, but fails to return a call from her months later, and learns subsequently that she has killed herself. Something tells him that her suicide was not a simple story and he begins to investigate it. Angie becomes involved (professionally), and they begin to realize that Karen was manipulated and driven to kill herself as part of a psychopath's crusade against her parents.In the course of tracking down the perpetrator, Angie and Patrick resume their personal relationship. Lehane does a nice job throughout the series with this aspect of things. Once again, questionable actions and extreme violence play a part in resolving the plot, and Patrick receives physical wounds to mirror the psychic wounds he takes from each case.I'm sorry to see this series come to an end.
    • 5/5
      This is the first book I have read by Lehane though I watched Gone, Baby, Gone and Mystic River and enjoyed both. I figured it was about time I read one of his books as we all know, books are generally better than the movie. I was not disappointed, this was a great piece of crime fiction.Not only was the plot fast paced and well-written, with plenty of twists, but the character development was great. I loved the interactions between Patrick and Bubba, who is a character unlike any other. Throw in Angie, who had left Patrick after Gone, Baby, Gone, she rejoins the team for this one, intrigued as they look for this person who completely destroyed a woman's life for no apparent reason.There is a lot of graphic violence but it didn't bother me, it added to the credibility of the story. I'm not sure whether Patrick and Angie are PI's so much as vigilantes in this one, but I enjoyed it very much. I've heard the next installment doesn't have as much Bubba, though it goes back to the story from Gone, Baby, Gone. I'll probably read it though I'll miss Bubba. I am also pretty sure I am going to read Shutter Island which I heard was much better than the movie which I did not see.I can see why Lehane is so popular. If you like the mystery/thriller genre with a little edge, I think you will enjoy this book.my rating 4.5/5
    • 5/5
      very good patrick kenzie is a private eye and he helps karon nichols and six months later she commits suicidehe finds that soeone drove her to do it
    • 3/5
      Not as good as the others in this series. The weakest I think.
    • 3/5
      What started off as another excellent Lehane book was ruined by the last couple of pages for me, unfortunately. Still, up until then, it had been great. The mystery is convoluted, thought-provoking & keeps the suspense going strong. We get to see a lot more of & find out more about Bubba. That right there makes it worth reading. I got a little tired of Kenzie's flashes of brilliance. I would have preferred he just reason it out soundly.

      Unfortunately, Lehane had to take the case an extra step. In itself, that wasn't too bad, kind of icing on the cake, but the idea that Kenzie would threaten - no promise - this devious man that he would come after him in the future was ridiculous. The guy was an unstable, one-time chess champion, who had proved he could & would resort to anything to destroy a person. The entire book was a fight through that very tangled web to get to the person ultimately responsible. So, we finally wind up with the true villain & Kenzie just walks? Very unsatisfactory.

      I'll look forward to the next book, if only to see if the situation is retrieved.
    • 2/5
      Not his best.
    • 2/5
      This is the second in Lehane’s Patrick Kenzie-Angela Gennaro series that I have read (after Gone, Baby, Gone), and I don’t think I cared for it much. I didn’t really like any of the characters, and the plot left me cold. I much prefer Lehane’s standalone books to his cynical, ultra-violent mystery series.
    • 4/5
      [Prayers For Rain] by Dennis LehaneKenzie & Gennaro Series Book #53.5 StarsFrom The Book:When a former client jumps naked from a Boston landmark, Private Investigator Patrick Kenzie wants to know why. Once a perky young woman in love with life, her suicide is the final fall in a spiral of self-destruction.What Kenzie discovers is a sadistic stalker who targeted the woman and methodically drove her to her death – a monster that the law can’t touch. But Kenzie can. He and his former partner, Angela Gennaro, will fight a mind-twisting battle against the psychopath, even as he turns tricks on them…My Views:I like Dennis Lehane's writing style. He even manages to insert some humor into stories about psychopaths and various other types of misfits. The main problem with this book was that his lead characters constantly did such unpredictable, unprofessional, unbelievable, and entirely unnecessary things to achieve their goal. It made the book about 120 pages too long. This small clitch won't deter me from reading more of this series, but hope he sticks more to his main story line in the future.
    • 4/5
      Patrick Kenzie has lost some enthusiasm for his work since Angela Gennaro left their partnership.He's hired by Karen Nichols to stop a stalker from bothering her. Patrick and his pal, Bubba, scare off the attempted assailant. Then, thinking that the job is done, he goes about his business. When he recieives a call from Karen, a bit later, he doesn't think it's anything urgent and doesn't return the call.When he sees the news that Karen has committed suicide, Patrick is ashamed that he didn't care enough to call her back.He gets Angela to join him and recreates Karen's life, from the time he last saw her, to the time of her death.What he finds is a plot that someone created to destroy Karen's life and her will to live.Lehane tells an intriguing story about the depths to which a person can sink and how hopelessness can change a person's life. Variations of this theme have been told in the past, but Lehane does the job well and brings the reader into finding the reasons why and what outcome will happen.Patrick and Angela have a special manner between them. Their conversations together and with other characters are unique and make them people that the reader wants to know more about.This was a most enjoyable, stand alone, thriller.
    • 4/5
      I must confess... I am not a fan of the hard-boiled American "Private Eye", who relies more on his physical prowess than mental powers to catch criminals. Hercule Poirot and his little grey cells, and the cosy drawing-room British murder mystery where violence almost always takes place backstage, is more to my taste. Given my usual predilections, I might never have discovered Dennis Lehane, had Martin Scorsese not made a movie out of Shutter Island. I wanted to see the movie; and since I make it a point never to see a mystery movie without reading the book, I read the book-and was hooked.

      Lehane writes beautifully (I mean, it is not great literature, but one does not look for it in a murder mystery); Prayers for Rain will hook you and pull you in from the first page, and the pace never lets up. The breathtaking pace is not built through incessant physical action, but rather through the steadily increasing tempo of dramatic tension. The book is so well structured that succeeding scenes almost naturally flow out of their predecessors. We never feel that somebody is building the narrative, rather it is flowing by itself. The novelist is almost invisible.

      The characterisation is also superb. Even the secondary characters are well-delineated. Lehane takes pains to build the world of his story. And in the creation of Wesley Dawe, the author has succeeded in creating a truly evil villain, somebody who will really makes us shudder.

      Are there flaws? Sure, for a purist. There are some loose ends which are not tied up cleanly. The "omnipotent" mailman as a literary device is straight out of G.K.Chesterton. Also, to make Wesley's and Scott's plans work, Lehane had to create a lot of co-conspirators, which makes the story rather far-fetched.

      However, all these can be ignored. The sheer pace and energy of the narrative will carry you through, bug-eyed and dry-mouthed, till the last page is turned, when the final twist will blow you away. The novel thrills... and what more does a "thriller" require to do?
    • 5/5
      5th in the Patrick Kenzie/Angela Gennaro series.Just when you think Lehane has reached a pinnacle, to your delight he outdoes himself. I didn’t think it was possible, but this book is, if anything better than its predecessor, Gone, Baby,Gone.A former client takes her life, and Kenzie can not understand why. Unwilling to let go and accept the official verdict of suicide, Kenzie begins investigating her life, trying to unravel the mystery of her rather sudden decline and self-destruction. He and Angie Gennaro have broken up both their professional partnership and their personal relationship as a consequence of the horrific case of child abduction they had worked together. But Angie rejoins Patrick to work out the puzzle. What they find is a deadly stalker.This is a flat-out thriller with some surprising and welcome developments of some of the recurring supporting characters in the series. The plot is the best yet. The writing continues to be the best in the field. Angie and Patrick continue to be real people with real lives outside of the work that they do together. You simply can not ask for more in any novel; the fact that the series not only holds up but continues to improve is some sort of miracle.A gripper, a real page turner, again this was a book I finished in one day because I simply could not put it down.Highly recommended.
    • 3/5
      Really good book. Very dark and very violent but the characters and the plot were excellent. Kenzie and Gennaro rock!
    • 4/5
      Sigh...no safety on a revolver people. Other than that, a pretty decent outing and what we thought would be the finale. Frankly, it should have been.
    • 5/5
      Prayers for Rain has been in my TBR pile for quite a while--several years at least. Surely not since 1999, though my copy is a new, non-remaindered hardcover, so probably since 2000. I don't feel that bad about leaving it there, because there are still no new Kenzie/Gennaro stories, and it's a bit sad knowing I've read the last one in my TBR pile.The series is about PI Patrick Kenzie, his complex professional/romantic relationship with his partner Angie Gennaro, and their psychotic but extremely loyal pal Bubba Rogowski.This 5th book in the series starts with Kenzie & Gennaro split up, both personally and professionally, and Patrick's not taking it well, reevaluating his life as Angie had. A young woman comes to him for help with a simple stalker, and he solves the problem without breaking a sweat, or even seeing her again.Six months later, the same young woman, who'd been the epitome of "sweet girl next door", has committed suicide. The fact that she'd called him 3 months earlier and he'd forgotten to get back to her makes Patrick curious, so he starts to check things out. The more he learns, the more curious he becomes.Before long, he's enlisted Angie & Bubba's help, and they find themselves afoul of the local mob, and embroiled in a case that's looking more sinister by the minute.It's dark, with no easy answers, and Kenzie's brand of solution is always satisfying--violence when necessary, but always with a psychological angle, never pointless brute force. There's also humor in the darkness, like Bubba complaining when he doesn't get to just blow something up.What grabs me about this, and the other books in the series, are the complex characters. We get the motivations of everyone, not just the main characters, and they all ring true. And yes, I've really enjoyed the ups and downs of the Kenzie/Gennaro relationship. It's not a sweet, HEA one, but it sucked me in.I guess I'll have to break down now and get Lehane's non-series books. I'm assured they're just as good, though having seen the movie version of Mystic River, I'm a little wary of reading it.
    • 4/5
      An excellent and strong finish to the series. The suspense factor pertained more to whether Patrick and Angie would get back together or not. Damn you Dennis Lehane for playing my emotions like a yo-yo. This book is also Bubba's time to shine, and boy does he.I used the “starâ€? system to rank the books in the series in the order that I liked them. In a non comparative sense I would give all of the books at least a solid 4 star ranking.
    • 4/5
      Good one excepting the bantering.
    • 4/5
      Karen Nichols, a seemingly perfect prime and proper young lady, hires private detective Patrick Kenzie to warn off Cody Falk, a stalker who has a history of rape and abuse of women. Patrick and his new sidekick, Bubba, who has the face of a deranged two-year-old but with the physique of a “steel boxcar with limbs” pay Cody a visit. Bubba rearranges Cody’s car and they leave with suitable threats of potential carnage should anything happen to Karen. Six months later Karen jumps naked from a six story building and Patrick wants to learn what happened.
      He learns that Karen’s boyfriend had been killed in a car accident and that she had been raped before her descent into drugs and despair. But he also discovers that someone had been setting her up.
      Feeling somewhat contrite at one point, Patrick decides to attend Mass in spite of being more than a lapsed Catholic. He’s astonished by the priest’s short sermon. “Father McKendrick definitely had Red Sox tickets. The parishioners looked dazed, but happy. The only thing good Catholics love more than God is a short service. Keep your organ music, your choir, keep your incense and processionals. Give us a priest with one eye on the Bible and the other on the clock, and we’ll pack the place like it’s a turkey raffle the week before Thanksgiving.”
      In a previous book in the series, Patrick had split up with his onagain-offagain sweetheart and investigative partner, Angie Gennaro. This case gets them back together. They need to discover why Karen had slowly descended into a quagmire of drugs and prostitution before committing suicide. They discover that her fiancé might have been deliberately killed in what had apparently purely an accident while crossing the street.. Karen's family is uncooperative and clearly hiding something. The family secrets begin to unravel.
      Despite some of its rather fantastical aspects — how convenient that Angie's grandfather is a mob boss with the power to call off the mob fangs at one point, and the level of evil strains credulity — this book reminds me a lot of some of Ross MacDonald’s better work, a peeling off of layers of ostensible respectability to reveal putrid corruption and evil permeating family relationships.

    • 5/5
      PIs Patrick Kenzie and Angela Gennaro, with backup from friend Bubba Rugowski, investigate the harassment and suicide of Karen Nichols. Excellent, well-written story with good characterization and a plot full of twists and turns.