Shutter Island

image (c) tower books

What: Shutter Island (the book; the movie comes out 2/19)

Rating: 8

Non-Quantifiable Rating: The kind of book that makes you suspicious of your mailman. And your dog.  And your mom.

It took me two weeks to read the first half of this book, and two hours to read the second half.  It was so slow to get into that I nearly threw in the towel - but at a certain point it grabbed me by the jugular and just wouldn't let go.  It's been a long time since I read a book that was able to both make me think and completely creep me out.  It's set in the 1950s on a shady island that houses a maximum security prison/psychiatric hospital.  Two U.S. Marshalls go to to the island to investigate a patient escape, and things just keep getting weirder and weirder.

I kept congratulating myself on figuring out the ending (I was SURE I knew how it would end) -- and then I kept being wrong.  And now that it's over, I would like to formally recommend the author for thorough psychiatric evaluation.  This guy must have been locked in a dark room and tortured by rabid squirrels as a baby.  Seriously, he needs help.  But in the meantime, we can all reap the benefits of his twisted mind.

The movie comes out in a few weeks, and Scorcese is directing (score!).  This book has the potential to make a pretty epic film, so I hope they don't screw it up.