Twelve years ago, private investigators Patrick Kenzie and Angela Gennaro were hired to find a kidnapped four-year-old girl. They succeeded, but the result was anything but a happy ending.
Kenzie found Amanda McCready in a loving, stable home and did as the law required, returning her to her neglectful, drug-addicted mother and sending the kidnappers to jail. Gennaro was so furious that she left him at the end of 鈥�Gone Baby Gone.鈥�
鈥淵ou did the right thing,鈥� says a character in Moonlight Mile, Dennis Lehane鈥檚 sixth and apparently final mystery starring the couple. 鈥淏ut you were still wrong.鈥�
Now a teenager, Amanda McCready has disappeared again. This time, Kenzie and Gennaro, now married and with a four-year-old daughter of their own, are determined to do right by her 鈥� no matter the fallout.
鈥淪ince we'd reconciled, we hadn't said the names Amanda or Helene McCready in our home until three days ago,鈥� recalls Kenzie. 鈥淚n those three days, every time one of us mentioned one of those names, it felt like someone had pulled the pin from a grenade."
Gennaro and Kenzie have aged more believably than is the case with characters in a lot of other series: He鈥檚 exhausted and scrambling for freelance gigs; she鈥檚 a grad-school student and stay-at-home mom who misses the adrenaline rush of her old job. The revival of the McCready case, and its attendant violence, sends both back into old patterns.
鈥淗er [protective] shell is made of quiet fury and wary disconnection,鈥� says Kenzie. 鈥淢ine is made of humor and sarcasm. Together we resemble a comedian failing an anger-management class.鈥�
The villains here aren鈥檛 nearly as compelling as in 鈥淕one Baby Gone,鈥� which was turned into a movie directed by Ben Affleck in 2007, but Lehane鈥檚 interest in investigating moral ambiguity and a genuine affection for his characters makes 鈥淢oonlight Mile鈥� a satisfying send-off.
