Theodore Boone: The Activist – John Grisham

 

© 2013 New York, Dutton Children’s Books

This is the best Theo Boone yet!

There now that the blurb is out of the way, you’ll want to run down to the local library or bookstore and obtain a copy of this little YA gem.

This time, Theo puts his debate team skills to not only defeat his opponents from the cross-town rival team, but to try to help save his friend’s family farm. It seems that all the politicians in the state and the businesses in the county want to push through a by-pass project which will displace a number of families on the outskirts of town at a cost of multiple million dollars while schools are getting shorted in the funding department.

Theo learns some valuable lessons about activism and ethics as he works through his case this time.

This is some of the better writing involved in the Theodore Boone series (see opening sentence above). It is one of the very best examples of internal struggle available on the current market. The moments where our protagonist wrestles with what is right, wrong, and just are on a par with FrankStockton’s classic short story “The Lady, or the Tiger?”

I can’t hold back my five reading glasses for this excellent example of juvenile suspense.

—Benjamin Potter, September 6, 2013

The Confession – John Grisham

© 2010 New York, Doubleday

Sixteen years ago, John Grisham spent nearly 500 pages having us sit beside a man on death row. The book was The Chamber. The impact was minimal. The story was just long. As much as I enjoy reading Grisham because of the intriguing stories that move quickly, I really did not like The Chamber—it was cumbersome, plodding, and depressing to boot. Two years ago, in one of the selections from Ford County, we returned to death row to watch a family spend the last few hours with their son and brother as he anticipated his date with the needle.

Today’s novel is one that takes us back to death row, back to the death house, back to the death chamber. I have not read Grisham’s only book-length non-fiction (a work called The Innocent Man, 2006), but I understand that work was foundational for the story that is The Confession. Perhaps I should go back and read it, but when I read Grisham, it’s for getaway.

This trip to the death chamber starts at a church in Topeka, Kansas, where a young minister—Keith Shroeder—is busy about his weekly business on a Monday morning. In walks Travis Boyette, newly released from prison, and bearing a heavy burden. Boyette confesses to Keith the rape and murder of one Nicole Yarber from Slone, Texas, nine years ago. Why own up now? Because the state of Texas is going to execute someone else for the crime on Thursday.

The story leads us on the trip from Kansas to Texas to try to stop the death of an innocent man. Along the way, we get the back story, the illegal force used to get a bogus confession, with pauses along the road for a love/hate relationship with the low-life who is the actual killer, but for whom we have a slight bit of pity because he, too, is dying of a tumor in his brain. Grisham also treats us to his signature, southern race tension throughout the story, Texas politics, and church politics as well.

How does The Confession compare to our earlier trip to death row? While The Chamber would only rate one of our reading glasses, this new story rates a whopping four out of five.

—Benjamin Potter, June 23, 2010

Theodore Boone: Kid Lawyer – John Grisham

© 2010 New York, Dutton Children’s Books

In the year 2000, John Grisham did something different. He wrote a novel that was NOT about lawyers. Well, at least it was different for him. The book was originally published in serial form in the Oxford American literary magazine. Subsequently, Doubleday released the book version of A Painted House in January 2001. The author has since released other non-lawyerly stories (Skipping Christmas, also Doubleday 2001; Bleachers, Doubleday 2003; and Playing for Pizza, Doubleday 2007). Now he is again trying something new. This time he is entering the juvenile market—albeit with a lawyer novel.

Theo Boone is the thirteen-year-old son of two lawyers—his father, a real estate lawyer, and his mother a successful divorce attorney who only represents the wife. He loves court and all the drama therein. He even loves to watch old Perry Mason reruns with his parents. His dream vacillates between being a high-profile courtroom lawyer and becoming a powerful judge in that same courtroom. In his eighth-grade class, he is the go-to guy for all problems involving the law (from escaped and impounded dogs to arrested brothers). In the midst of the biggest murder trial to hit the town of Strattenburg, Theo finds himself in possession of the only evidence to guide justice. And he’s promised not to tell anyone.

This is a fast-paced novel which is a great introduction to “lawyer fiction” for most readers. Appealing about this book is the moving story with rich characters and the absence of foul language and sex scenes that permeate courtroom dramas aimed at an older audience. You can almost overlook the main drawback—scenes that seem to drop a line or two, requiring the reader to fill in a bigger gap than he should.

For this excellent effort in introducing his writing to younger audiences, I can award Grisham a solid four out of five reading glasses.

—Benjamin Potter, June 23, 2010

A Time to Kill – John Grisham

Before he’d made a name for himself outside his home state of Mississippi, John Grisham was a lawyer. Then he decided to write a book. The first one took some time, but he completed it and shopped it around. It wasn’t his first book that made him famous, but the second which was purchased for filming. The success of the film version of The Firm got the good lawyer noticed. Soon we were being blessed by a book a year and movies right on the heels of the books. And finally his publisher, Doubleday, discovered the obscure raw talent that really was Grisham—A Time to Kill.

What would a father do when he saw the vermin that abused and disfigured his daughter getting off on a technicality? How would he respond? What would matter to him? Carl Lee Hailey has the answer in the form of an automatic weapon, hidden and ready, blasting away to gain vengeance on the rednecks that destroyed his daughter’s life and his own.

Young and green, lawyer Jake Brigance seeks to make his name by defending this black man in a time and a place where the Klan runs rampant and the black community is still referred to as “the Quarters.”

At times the writing is stiff and shows the inexperience of a new novelist. At times the lawyer within takes over, trying to convince the reader as a good trial lawyer would before a seated jury. But always the thrill of this story grips you. It is easy to look beyond the raw edges because of the raw edginess of Grisham’s subject. You may not want to read another courtroom drama, but you will want to read this one. You may be tired of hearing how successful Grisham has become, but you will want to read him before all the accolades. This is a fine piece of literature that is not to be missed. It should be put on every to be read list. And even on some to be read again lists.

—Benjamin Potter, March 2007