PERRY – Grisham’s latest is nice if you’re sick of the non-fiction Grisham that’s unfolded here
The FBI raids the office of a billionaire trial lawyer who brought down Big Tobacco after flipping a cohort in a judicial bribery scheme. His own defense lawyer turns against him when a former district attorney reveals another scheme involving yet another judge. A judge and several attorneys go to prison. That billionaire had previously been a witness in another government investigation that resulted in the jailing of a trial lawyer known as “the judge maker” and two state court judges.
After reading that actual news in Mississippi over the past few years, it is a relief to enjoy the fiction of legal thriller novelist John Grisham. The international best seller and former Mississippi legislator recently released his first collection of short stories, “Ford County,” where he takes us back to the imaginary county in northeast Mississippi that was the setting for “A Time to Kill” for seven tales of Mississippi antics. (In the movie, the setting was Madison County and Canton.)
In “Blood Drive,” three country boys take a drive to Memphis to donate blood to a neighbor injured in a construction accident. A few six-packs into the trip, chaos ensues as they detour to a strip club.
Ride along with a wheelchair bound mother and her two sons as they make the ride to Parchman in a borrowed furniture van for their brother’s scheduled execution. “Fetching Raymond” tells of the final hours of a ne’re-do-well who in prison has transformed into an Ignatius Reilly optimist.
Madison County Journal
11/19/9