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Summary: A Slow-Paced Novel about Doing Good in a Small Town
Review: There's little left of small-town life and constructive local newspapers in most of America now. Clearly, John Grisham regrets that and writes nostalgically about Clanton, Mississippi, as seen through the eyes of its one outsider, Willie Traynor, the new owner of the local newspaper. He even makes the drunks charming while smoothing out much of the pain of racism, segregation, the Vietnam War and economic woes. Mr. Grisham is so rosy that he sees the glass as overfilled with goodness. His narrator even visits every local church to report on their services.So if you like books that portray startling action, baffling mysteries or heart-pounding suspense, this is not the book you are looking for. While the jacket copy and advertising for the book focus on the trial of obviously guilty Danny Padgitt who raped and murdered a woman while her young children watched, that's just one story among many in the book. The novel builds around a series of short stories about the microcosm of Clanton as it reflected the pressures in the rest of the world. The main focus of the story development is around the growing friendship between young Willie Traynor and Ms. Callie Ruffin, a black mother who has raised an astonishing set of children (all but one of whom have Ph.D.'s). Ms. Ruffin is affected by the murder, having been selected as the last juror for that case. Although the principles that Mr. Grisham supports are ones that I agree with, his book is so prettied up and simplified that I found much of what he wrote about to be unappealing. There's an Aesop's Fables aspect to the story that makes it feel like it's aimed at children rather than adults. Human errors happen, but they are the exception to the reality. Corruption occurs . . . but it doesn't seem to harm anyone very much. Hatred exists . . . but the harm is mostly in creating homesickness. Inevitably, anyone who writes about small town Mississippi will be compared to William Faulkner. To compare this book to Mr. Faulkner's work would demean Mr. Faulkner. Stick to the original!
Rating: 
Summary: Liked it very much
Review: I think this latest Grisham offering is very well developed. I like his characters, the southern setting, and in general find it to be worthy of his name. Raymond Austin
Television director of The Saint, The Avengers, Hawaii Five-O, Hart to Hart, Vegas, Quincy, Magnum, P.I., AirWolf, Spencer: For Hire, JAG and many others. And the author of, "The Eagle Heist" and "Dead Again" from the Beauford Sloan Mystery series.
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Summary: Fast reading, barely worth it
Review: Several good court scenes are not enough to salvage this book, as Grisham stretches the plot needlessly through page after page. Actually, although this book is fast-enough reading, you can get through it even faster by checking out the plot summary on the dust jacket. It takes you up to page 291 (out of about 370). Even then, the ending is rather anticlimactic. Hard-core Grisham fans, wanting to preserve their record of reading everything he's written, will have a reason to read this book. The rest of us can surely find better ways to spend even the short time needed to read it.
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Summary: I enjoyed it!
Review: Well written and inspiring, like Jackson McCrae's THE BARK OF THE DOGWOOD, and yet having elements of Grisham's KING OF TORTS or even A PAINTED HOUSE (if you can believe that-think setting, not plot) I found this to be a truly enjoyable book. Perhaps this was because I understood that Grisham was creating a hybrid work in a sense; combining elements and style from his other books. The guy has written volumes and it's only natural that the would want to branch out and create something new out of his ideas. I would highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys a good literary read.
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Summary: The Last Juror
Review: The Last Juror. John Grisham. United States, March 2004. 355 The last Juror is John Grisham's fisrt book since A Time to Kill to be set in Ford County, Mississippi. Like all other John Grisham novels, it it a courtroom suspense thriller that catches you in at the very beginning with a crime. Unlike other John Grisham Books, most of it takes place outside the courtroom and offices of lawyers. It is written in first person by a newspaper owner and reporter for the small county. This book deals with issues such as segregation and the Vietnam War. This book is set up to read like the diary and life of Willie Traynor in a small southern county. The book starts out with the brutal rape and murder of Rhoda Kasselaw,a young widow looking for companionship. Her last words before she died in her neighbor's arms were "Danny Padgit. It was Danny Padgit." Danny Padgit belonged to a corrupt family who payed off the police and judicial system in order to be overlooked as they grew and sold marijuana extensively. Willie Taylor and his newly bought newspaper company are very excited to be dealing with such sensational news in quiet old Ford County. It is just what Willie needs in order to get the almost bankrupt newspaper going again. The court case and the story of Willie's life and the community are what the rest of the book deals with. This book is filled with southern history in the seventies. Some of the points the author talks about are the influence of the Vietnam war, the corrupt nature of the judicial branch (which may not be just history), Black and white segregation and the desegregation movement, and when the President granted amnisty to draft dodgers, He talks about how these things affected the county that Willie lived in. After hanging out for with some Vietnam vets, Willie comments, "No wonder we lost the war-everybody was stoned." Strangely, this book overwhelmingly has the theme of death which is not a habit for John Grisham. I'm not sure what the author's point in this would be. Maybe it would be, people die and you have to learn how to deal with it. He might be trying to show us some history that we can learn from - for example, when talking about the Vietnam War. In the book, Willie writes "What the hell are we doing in Vietnam? ... Our failure has been even grander than that of the French, and we're not finished yet." This shows that the author definately thinks that we made mistakes in that war and that we should learn from them. Maybe he is tring to show us that with all our fear of people who are different or mean, we lose sight of who's really dangerous; ourselves. When talkimg about the impact of black athletes in football after the desegregation, Willie says "But those white folks sho had been so adamantly opposed to accepting black students were suddenly transformed that Friday night." This shows that the author thinks that white people were making a bigger deal out of the segregation than need be. There was nothing to be afraid of. These are just a few of my speculations. You can make your own when you finish reading the book. This book was very educational and interesting, but there was not much happening in the middle of the book. There was a big lull of just ordinary life and talk. Although this may be true about how life really is, you shouldn't write a book like that. If you are a patient reader and can get through the middle part, the book turns out to be very interesting, exciting, and educational.
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Summary: Ahh, the old South and the new
Review: There are so many riviting aspects to this latest Grisham novel that it's hard to know where to begin. First, there is the old vs. the new with regards to the south--how it has changed, is changing, and will change. That in itself is enough for a book and reminds me of other writers who have tackled that slippery slope: McCrae in his Bark of the Dogwood and Conroy in Prince of Tides. But the most intriguing aspect of this Grisham book is his characters. Then again, that's always the most intriguing aspect of his work. In any other writer's hands, the character of Danny Padgitt (how's that for a white trash name?) would be a cardboard cut-out. But in Grisham's he's flesh-and-blood. And Danny literally "gives" the newspaper in the town new life when he commits a murder. As with all media, they love sensationalism, and the Ford County Times--the paper that Willie Traynor now owns--is no exception. Seizing the opportunity, Traynor splashes the gory details all over "the Times" and the result is that he an instant celebrity and also a marked man. Padgitt finally gets his, but not full-out. His life sentence is evidently not quite as "lifelong" as everyone thought, and as soon as he's released, the killing starts. This, all because of his statement to the jury on his way out that he will have his revenge on the jurors. Lovely. Especially if you're one of them. All through this excellent plot, Grisham weaves the lives (or lackthereof) of the colorful characters in the town--yet another aspect of southern writing (again, McCrae or Conroy), and it's really these people that create the landscape and backdrop for this book. The entire novel reads like a well-done combination of Grisham's legal thrillers, his homage to Mississippi (A Painted House), and his foray into small town Southern America. Without a doubt this is his best effort to date.
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Summary: Very disappointing
Review: Being a huge Grisham fan, I could not wait to read The Last Juror. That quickly turned to being unable to wait to finish it! The book began great, but quickly changed. It just seemed like it did not know where it was going...so many things, too many things were going on. I'd pass on this one.
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Summary: Wonderful depiction of small southern town in 60's
Review: I loved this book. Being part southern,I can attest to the realism and beautiful prose along with a knockout plot. I hated to finish the book and wish there was a sequal in the works. Most of Grisham's books have interested, educated and entertained me. This one is one of his best along with a surprising change of pace. I cannot imagine anyone not loving this book. The characters are so real they jump off the page. If they ever make it a movie, it would never do the book justice. This is five star stuff.
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Summary: easy to figure out, but still a good read
Review: I was hoping for another sleepless night poring over the pages of my latest purchase - alas, I just knew from the title title that JG was back in the saddle and about to hand us another heart-stopping,suspense-filled saga. NOT SO...(although my review of the book is delayed, I did buy it on the release date).
I enjoyed the lead characters way of gradually "finding his space" among the "regulars", but the storyline was VERY predictable.
I won't tell (I hate when people spoil the ending!!!) who the killer is, but JG gave a hint of some of the vintage Grisham stuff to which we've grown accustomed. Read this book or watch American Idol, both will probably conjure up the same emotions.
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Summary: Something new from Grisham
Review: I enjoyed this book. The protagonist, Willie Traynor, is a journalist/entrepreneur who grows up page by page, and I enjoyed his journey. The town of Clanton is carefully drawn. The book is true to the 1970s as I remember them. And the crime that is the catalyst was truly despicable and movingly told. All that said, there are some disappointments. First of all, I figured out whodunnit and why well before the book ended, and I hate it when that happens. And it does seem to be a valentine to the death penalty, which bothered me enormously. (This from the man who wrote THE CHAMBER?) Perhaps Grisham was just being true to the feelings of his characters, but the blood lust did strike me as creepy. Still, this is a very good writing trying something new, and I applaud the effort.
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